


You Woke Up and Morning Smiled

by Lauren_StDavid



Series: Beechwood [5]
Category: The Monkees, The Monkees (TV)
Genre: Developing Relationship, Explicit Sexual Content, Light Angst, Light Bondage, M/M, Morning Sex, Orgasm Delay/Denial, Shower Sex, Slight Mike/Micky
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-29
Updated: 2018-12-03
Packaged: 2019-08-09 12:42:43
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 17
Words: 37,097
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16450199
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lauren_StDavid/pseuds/Lauren_StDavid
Summary: Mike and Peter are truly together now, their relationship in the honeymoon phase, but there's always that first estrangement, brought on by that first discovery of something devastating, such as learning your partner is a married man...Huge thanks to the Sunshine Factory website https://monkees.coolcherrycream.com/ for all the fantastic info and pictures! I couldn't have written any of these fics without that lovely treasure trove to mine.





	1. Chapter One

**Author's Note:**

> Elements of their rl personalities have seeped in.

Mike’s hum rippled into a purr and elongated into a moan, disturbing the silence of the morning bedroom. And, Jesus, if he didn’t love waking like this, sliding from sleep to half-wakefulness to full consciousness while his lazy, hazy arousal slowly grew. As if it could do anything else with that delicious sensation right _there_ , stirring him to wake and to full mast. Best of all? That his days had started like that ever since he and Peter had begun sharing a bed.

He luxuriated in the feeling, slipping free of the last tendrils of slumber to curl into the taut yet soft ass pressing into his groin, and to rub against it with the same slow, soft purpose as Peter was him. He tucked his knees more firmly into the space made by Peter’s bent legs and ran a hand down Peter’s body, more sleep-warmed than sun-warmed at the moment. Mike pressed harder, his intent unmistakeable, trailing his hand down Peter’s chest and abs to find, as he’d supposed, that Peter was standing at full salute too, obviously needing attention.

Mike wrapped his hand around him, and, when Peter didn’t respond, nuzzled into Peter’s neck. That met with no reply, so he tightened his grip on Peter’s erect cock. “If you’re still asleep, then I’m doing something wrong,” he whispered, his voice morning-husky. “And I know I’m not.”  He nipped where Peter’s neck met his shoulder and Peter’s mix of a sigh and a giggle told him his bed partner was faking sleep, which made Mike press an answering smile into Peter’s nape and squeeze the velvet firmness he held.

“Good morning,” Peter said.

“Oh, yeah,” Mike agreed. It was. They all were with Peter by his side or, as here, Mike curled into Peter’s side. He released his hold on Peter’s cock and brought his thumb up to Peter’s mouth to first run it over that bottom lip he loved before making Peter open for him and suck, tonguing and wetting Mike’s digit. With Peter having such regular sex, he didn’t leak so much pre-cum, although Mike knew he could make him release more, but he liked Peter sucking on him—his cock, lips, fingers, whatever. It was all more than good.

Mike ran his wetted thumb over the exposed head of Peter’s cock and waited for Peter’s soft moan of response before nudging Peter’s legs apart to slot himself in between them. He couldn’t rut for long like this without lube, but it was a nice way to warm up. For both of them—Mike was big enough to stroke against Peter in this position, and he loved the soft, fine hair on Peter’s inner thighs and the tight constriction this position gave. Seemed Peter liked it too, enough to remove Mike’s hand from his erection and bring it to his mouth.

“So who started this time?” Mike asked. They operated on a dealer’s choice system.

Peter was too occupied sucking on Mike’s fingers in the way he knew got Mike going to reply.

“I think you started in your sleep there,” Mike continued, giving a less gentle thrust. “Guess you were having a good dream?”

Peter eased Mike’s wet fingers from his mouth. “I think _you_ started trying to poke me in _your_ sleep.”

Mike huffed out a laugh. “Wouldn’t be the first time. You’re just too dang irresistible, babe.”

The first time he’d woken up to find himself draped over Peter and rutting mostly on his hip, Mike had been surprised and embarrassed. Now he rasped his thumb over Peter’s stubble. He loved that slightly roughened feel to his Peter. “Well, tell you what. Seeing as you pleased me so much last night—”

“This morning. By the time we got to bed, it was this morning.”

Yeah. After their new weekly Friday slot at With a Twist. “Okay. You pleased me so much earlier this morning, except for the sass”—for which he delivered a slight slap to one tempting ass cheek—“that you can choose.” And probably for the best—Mike had left him gaping. He’d seen it when cleaning Peter up after. It was just as he said: Peter was irresistible. Simply being with him got Mike so fucking horny that he just had to have him, right then and there. And if that happened to be someplace it couldn’t happen, well, that delay was reflected in the fierce, urgent need with which Mike took him as soon as he could. And usually for as long and as much as he could. So if Peter wanted to have him now, no problem. No problem at all.

“Mmm.”

Peter’s quirk of seeing sounds as images must’ve been catching, because that noise Peter made was all shades of bronze becoming tones of gold, swelling to a fat, bright shine. He peeped over his shoulder. “I’m so comfortable and feeling so lazy. Could I just lie here and you do all the work?”

Mike’s grin was crooked. Peter had caught him on the hop, as usual. He was no fragile creature, for all his shining hair and pixie-pointed nose and ears. “Guess I tired you out, huh?  And, Pete, you never ‘just lie there’. But sure.”

Peter twisted his head a little more. “What do you feel like, Michael?”

His voice was deeper and smoother than ever first thing. Not velvet—something tougher. Mike would figure it out one day. He had time. All he knew at that moment was it revved him higher. _Harder._ “I’d love to fuck you, yeah. But with just a little tiny bit of slick so I have to work for it, and you feel it all weekend. How’s that sound?”

Peter dislodged Mike when he upped and reached then twisted back to drop the tube of K-Y Jelly between them and turned back to position himself, all in one smooth, seamless movement.

‘“Be prepared’, huh?” Mike’s grin was wide. “ _Love you_ ,” he whispered, right into Peter’s ear, making him shiver. God, he loved that ripple down Peter’s muscles. He hadn’t tired of seeing it—and causing it—once in the two weeks since they’d become lovers. Two weeks, after two years of foreplay, as he sometimes thought of it.

“Want me to—”

“No, no. You get comfy. And I know that’s you saying hurry up.” He smacked the ass cheek nearest to him and Peter gave that moan that fired Mike’s blood. Mike slicked his finger, to run it up Peter’s cleft and circle the whorls of his hole, accessible to him with Peter’s top leg crossed high over his lower like that. “You and your yoga? Never stop,” Mike muttered, not for the first time, enjoying the flex and give of Peter’s protector muscle.

He didn’t prep him much. No need; Peter was still loose enough from earlier. Mike slicked himself up, applying the thinnest film of gel, and moans from both him and Peter sounded in unison as Mike pushed in, slow and true. He took it easy, a long, measured slide home until he bottomed out, pulling back to do it again and again. His fingers still slick, he gave a rub to Peter’s taint, trying to stroke the little bump of his prostate from the outside as well, until the changed tenor of Peter’s response told Mike he should take him in hand, should pump him in time with his own thrusts.

He’d wanted to take his time—their time—for them to have a long, languid fuck, an easy, relaxed start to the weekend, but Peter pushing to meet Mike thrust for thrust and wrapping his hand around Mike’s on his shaft called up that now-familiar low curling tightening in Mike’s groin. The tingle, the spiral, coiled up Mike’s spine, despite him wanting to make this last. “Love fucking you,” he groaned. “The way you feel. _God_ , Peter. Every time, it’s better. It’s _perfect_.”

He murmured a few more broken phrases, meaning each and every one. Peter loved Mike’s voice during sex, whether it was a groaned description of how it felt when Mike took him, or dirtier, darker talk, and within a minute, Peter went rigid, crying out Mike’s name and coming into their joined hands, triggering Mike’s climax. The room spun as he came, his body stiffening before he pulsed, his world narrowed down to the cry Peter gave at feeling Mike releasing into him.

Mike floated slowly back to himself, pulling free of the clutch of Peter’s body to roll onto his back. They needed to clean up but instead it was their usual tussle to see who could pull the other onto him to snuggle. Peter won, tucking Mike’s head to nestle on his shoulder, and, despite knowing he should get up, Mike settled more fully into the feel of Peter, regretting he hadn’t been prepared enough to have something to hand to wipe them with.

He bit at the collarbone beneath him, making Peter wriggle and protest. “Wonder if anyone will bring us coffee,” he muttered.

“Yeah. We should have a system in place, something like ringing a bell,” came Peter’s reply. “Actually, try yelling? Micky might bring us some.”

“Yeah, and he might cop an eyeful.” Mike slid to Peter’s side, propping his head on an elbow to regard his partner. “Try to, anyway.”

Peter folded his arms under his head. “I don’t know what you mean.”

Mike laughed at Peter’s attempt to flutter his eyelashes. “We said we wouldn’t ask each other about our pasts, and I won’t.” God knew he had enough skeletons. “But if you wanted to tell me anything…”

“What, like that I was a child prodigy? Or that I was married young, say?”

Mike poked Peter’s dimple rather than look him in the eye. As jokes went…

“I’m disgustingly sticky,” Peter commented.

“And it’s only gonna get crusty. We’d better hit the shower. Davy didn’t come back?”

Peter shook his head.

Yeah, the littlest Casanova tended not to, on a Friday, working the group’s growing popularity to his advantage. “Fans go crazy for ‘lead’ in the title,” he’d told them, sharing the fruits of his reading of some long think-piece article in a music magazine with them, before declaring himself the band’s ‘lead singer and lead percussionist’, only to have Micky hotly dispute both titles.

“And Micky’s busy outside.” Peter cocked his head to listen to the sounds coming from the garage of metal being banged and welded.

“Hope he’s not working on the Mobile.” Mike stretched, then winced at a loud clang and metallic screech from outside.

“No. He’s building a robot.”

“He’s b—what? Is that why we can’t put the car in the garage anymore?”

Peter nodded, stretching carefully and dabbing at himself with a discarded T-shirt. “A sort of robot replica of himself. He calls it Metal Micky. Says we won’t know the difference between the two of them when he’s finished.”

“Should we be glad or worried that he’s building himself a boy robot?” Mike queried, a grin shaping his face as Peter, now standing, doubled over with laughter. “And _a twin of Micky_? Lord above. Come on. Let’s grab a shower while we can.”

 _While we can shower together_ , he didn’t need to specify. They tried to keep things low-key around Davy and Micky, not make out while the other guys were around, for instance. He and Peter had progressed to hand-holding in front of them, or Peter hooked an ankle around Mike’s while they sat on the couch and watched TV or listened to music.

A couple of evenings ago, Peter had leaned over Mike when Mike was sitting at the table, doing the finances, resting his chin on Mike’s head and looping his arms around Mike’s chest. That wasn’t too bad; they all leaned on or against one another, but Peter had bent his head over to rub his nose upside down against Mike’s and Mike’s surprised giggle had Davy turning around from the phone to see what was going on. Without missing a beat, he’d gone back to whatever he was saying to his latest chick.

Mike wondered, not for the first time, who Peter was being so careful for, who he was getting gradually used to their physical affection—the other two or Mike. Mike, not the cuddliest or most open of guys, found he didn’t care either way. Just part of Peter being Peter, working his Peter magic, he guessed. Maybe one day they’d be necking while swinging in the hammock, while Davy lay on the chaise underneath. Or Peter’d be cuddling on top on him while he reclined on the couch, watching a movie, with Mick sitting on the floor, his back against the couch, watching it too.

“Think fast!”

Mike dodged and caught the balled socks Peter threw at him. “Peter, these are odd!”

“They are not. I have another pair exactly the same.” Peter tied the belt of his robe. “So, if you wear those, they and we will be matching.”

“I am not wearing mismatched socks!” He threw the pair back, slipping into his robe. “If you speed up, I’ll see what I can do for you in the shower.”

“You’re only saying that because you’re in a hurry to get breakfast. Lunch. Whatever.”

“Whatever’s left, you mean.” Mike held the door open for Peter to go first so he could get in a swat at that ass. He couldn’t resist it.


	2. Chapter Two

In the bathroom, Mike glared for long seconds at the new white plastic bottle. “What in the world is that?” he finally asked.

“It’s called shampoo, Michael.” Peter, already naked and under the water, flicked lather at him.

Mike took the bottle and unscrewed the cap for a suspicious sniff. “But this is apple!”

“They added new ones to the range and it was on a special. It seemed okay in the store.”

“But…”  He couldn’t think of a way to say it that didn’t sound pathetic. “You always have apricot!” burst free.

“There’s a strawberry too. I got both for the price of… Michael? I didn’t realize you liked the other one so much.”

“It’s not…” Mike shrugged out of his robe and jostled Peter under the shower for more of the spray.

“Am…I supposed to run this sort of thing by you? I’ve never been in a gay relationship so I don’t know—” The _therugh_ noise Peter’s words ended in were a result of Mike advancing on him, to resolve the situation to both their advantages and satisfaction, even if it slowed down their start to the day.

“So what’s wrong with apple?” asked Peter, dressing after, his pace and movements slow and sated.

Mike rode the wave of pride washing through him at being the cause of Peter’s languor. “Oh, nothing.” He checked the caps were on all the bottles and cannisters they’d used.

Peter waited, his raised eyebrow reminding Mike with no need for words how they’d promised to be open and truthful with each other. “I guess I just sorta associate the apricot scent with you,” Mike confessed. “Or you with apricot…” He ducked his head to button his shirt.

“Robert Michael Nesmith, you big softie!” Peter poked him. “That’s supposed to be my role! Oh, wait! This is far out—are you becoming the female in this relationship? Like, are you going to start stealing my jackets and shirts, the way chicks do their boyfriend’s?”

“No need, babe. They’re all communal. Who does that red and black striped sweater you all wear even belong to, anyway?” Mike had often wondered, _and_ how it seemed the right size for each of them.

“True. And you’d be more likely trying to get into my pants than my shirts.” Peter’s wicked smile made his meaning plain.

“Hey! Well, yeah.” Mike’s grin matched Peter’s for width, if not lewdness. He hoped.

 “Okay, so maybe it’s that we’re becoming more like each other, Hm. Am I going to start wearing a hat and get all tough and macho with promoters and owners, arguing over clauses in contracts and quoting union regulations and—” He couldn’t speak for laughing and trying to defend himself. “Mercy! Pax!” He held up his hands in surrender against Mike’s tickling.

Mike started the dryer. “Don’t think I won’t be punishing you for calling me a chick,” he warned.

_Counting on it_ , said Peter’s smirk.

“And I’ve kinda stopped wearing a hat so much,” he reminded Peter. Peter didn’t think his hair was too crazy, enjoying, among other things, curling his finger into the swoop of bangs over Mike’s eye when Mike was lying in bed and Peter sitting reading. If Peter liked it, that was enough for Mike. “Hey, couldya go see if there’s anything to eat besides cereal, if that? Might have to run to the store.”

He tried to remember when they’d last shopped. Adding this new Friday gig to their now-regular two early slots a week at the Duke Box had thrown their routine out. And, he had to admit, being with Peter had melted Mike’s routine like candlewax. Of course. Who wouldn’t prefer to spend time with his hot-as-all-hell boyfriend, whether on the beach or at a club or preferably in the pad, where a hot look or heated touch so quickly and easily became a tumble between the sheets, or a fumble against the wall of the sundeck, or—hell; Mike blushed—a quickie behind the drumkit?

He hoped now as he had at the time that playing a loud record covered what they did in their upstairs room, mid-afternoon, and that they’d been hidden by the tree on the deck, and — _God!_ —that Micky never found out. And now, the garage off-limits with Micky’s robotics project meant one less possible place to— The downstairs closet would have to be added to their roster of venues, then.

Peter had turned to leave, but paused, and now looked back, a slight frown pleating his forehead. Mike, who’d resisted his usual temptation to slap Peter’s departing ass, smirked in turn. Peter kept him on the hop enough; do him good to be wrongfooted for once. _Think I’m the loser, though_. Mike hurried to finish and join his partner.

“Anything edible?” he queried, making for the coffeepot. Cold. _Damn._

“Resisting the urge to riff on that…voilà!” Peter pointed with a flourish to two plates of sandwiches.

“That was quick.”

“Oh, Micky left them. He must have taken a lunchbreak while we were…busy.”

“Well, I think it’s his turn.” Mike leaned over the counter to check the household job openings chart on the wall. “Oh, actually no. Says here it’s Jimmy Cagney’s day to cook. In Micky’s handwriting, in pencil, over the top of Micky’s name.” He poured the mixed Kool-Aid from the jug into the two waiting glasses. “So I guess that plate is yours and this one mine?” The orange plastic glass that Peter tended to use stood near one plate and the blue one Mike gravitated to near the other.

“Cheese and tomato!” Peter lifted a corner of his sandwich for a peek as he set it on the round table. “I didn’t think there was much of either left.”

“There wasn’t.” Mike lifted his top slice of bread off to reveal sliced pickle and sliced raw onion. He cast an envious glance at Peter’s fare. “I really think we need to talk to Micky about…things. I’m gonna call him in.”

“No, don’t break his concentration. This robot project is the longest he’s ever worked on one of his brilliant ideas.”

“Longest… Peter, he started yesterday! Oh, yeah, I guess that’s pretty long-term. Remember the attempt to install an elevator? On the outside of the pad? Lasted, what, an afternoon?”

“Until he fell off one too many times, swinging from that rope trying to drill into the wall.” Peter winced in belated sympathy. “Here.” He’d soon ditched the raw onion and remade the sandwiches with a more equal distribution of cheese, tomato and pickle. Mike smiled his thanks around a huge mouthful of bread and cheese. He was starving—sex with Peter burned off a load of calories. Peter wasn’t exactly picking daintily at his lunch, either.

He wondered for a moment why Peter dragged his chair around the table to sit almost opposite. But only for a moment, until Peter slipped off a moccasin and inched his bare foot up Mike’s leg, his face carefully neutral. He even kept up a conversation about a beach party planned for next week, all the while scrunching his foot, then feet, closer to Mike’s zipper.

“You going for some sort of record? See how quick you can get me hard?” Mike half-yelped.

“Just stretching my legs.” Peter was at his wide-eyed best.

“And I’m”—Mike grabbed Peter’s ankles to yank his feet under Mike’s backside and trap them between Mike and the chair—"just stretching my arms.” He pressed into the squirming toes under him as Peter tried to wriggle free. “Not sure this was a good idea. Watching you writhe like that…”

“Hey, guys.” Micky came in, heading for the kitchen table, empty glass in his hand. “Any soda left?”

“Good timing.” Mike poured what was left of what he’d call the cold drink into Micky’s glass, feeling Peter free himself when Mike shifted position. Micky looked away. _Now’s a good a time as never,_ Mike thought, and stood. “Mick. Micky. Is everything okay?”

“Uh-huh. Course.” Micky drained his glass.

“Okay. So are we okay? Are we cool, man?” Mike had always been a ‘rip off the Band-Aid’ sort. He stood directly in front of his band mate, meeting his eyes. “Is _this_ cool?” he prodded, flicking his gaze at Peter, calmly eating fruit. “You seemed fine with things.”

“I…am. I really am. I don’t have any hang-ups about stuff. You know that.” Micky sighed. “Just, changes, and all? Gimme a bit to get used to things, okay?”

“And if things are not fine, for whatever reason, you tell us, right? Or me, or Pete,” Mike amended, hoping the correction was swift enough.

“Yeah. Hey, I’m happy for you. It’s groovy that you’re— That’s not a deal.”

“Micky.” Peter came up behind him. “We love you, man.”

“I know! And I love you. You, you.” He swung a finger between them. “Just, got me thinking, you know?”

“Oh no.” Mike sat. “That’s never good.”

“Tell me about it.” Micky heaved another sigh. “But us, we’re good. I’d hug, but…” He indicated his oil-stained overalls. His grin when he left looked more like the old Micky than he had in a week or so.

Mike gave Peter a one-shoulder shrug, and Peter shrugged the opposite shoulder back. “ _Lola?_ ” he mouthed.

“Oh.” With all that was happening between him and Peter, Mike hadn’t spared much thought for Micky’s fledgling romance—if indeed there was one—with the petite Duke Box DJ. “Try and speak with him later?” he whispered, pledging to be less wrapped up in himself.

And it would have to be later: Saturday had to be for catching up with stuff before they worked on a new song. Playing such regular gigs in an area as small as the Strip demanded constant fresh material. “Laundry or grocery list first?” he asked.

“Or…surfing?” Peter crossed to stare out of the back windows. “Surf’s up.”

Mike blinked at the jargon. “You’ll be subscribing to _Surfer Magazine_ next and suggesting we write some surf pop tunes.”

“Come out!” Peter urged. “Come out and watch. You know you want to.”

“Well, that depends.” Mike cast a look around the pad and all the jobs that needed doing.

“On what?” Peter leaned against the window. Posing. Showing off.

“On what you’re planning on wearing.”

“Ah.” Peter grinned, knowing he had him. “The red shorts it is then.”

He sprinted for the downstairs closet, Mike close behind him, wondering if Peter had seen his fantasy of earlier involving that location. Wondering…and half-hoping.

It was a couple hours later, the best of the day gone, when the two, a little more sandy and salty than they had been earlier due to Peter surfing and Mike spectating, sat down with their guitars. Peter took up his six-string electric and Mike his twelve-string to work on a song Peter had been fiddling with on and off for years. Mike was determined to get it nailed down. It was complex melodically, and Mike soon switched to the organ, adding some notes to the grooving, insistent, get-in-your-head guitar lick Peter threw out so effortlessly.

“I want Micky singing just like that. Dark and looping,” Mike tried to explain. He never regretted his lack of formal musical understanding as much as he did when he wrote with Pete. Pete could of course note anything down, and never made Mike feel inferior. “We need the others.” Mike’s idea was to have all of them singing, back and forth, with upbeat lyrics playing off against the rumble of the rhythm.

“We were born to love one another,” Mike sang from Peter’s notebook. “What?” he asked, under the weight of Peter’s stare.

“I like watching you sing.”

“ _Watching_ me sing?”

“Yeah. Your lips look so…succulent. Especially the bottom one. Plush, you know?”

“Oh. I… Never had anyone tell me that before.”  Mike hoped he wasn’t blushing. He stared too, when Peter bent over his guitar, his bangs in his eyes, lost in his own musical world.

“Sounds good, Pete!” called Micky, washing the lunchtime dishes before he got started on dinner. Well, no choice: they didn’t exactly have a lot of cookware. But then, they didn’t do a lot of fancy cooking.

“It does,” Mike echoed. He encouraged Peter a little more, hoping the call-and-response would prompt more lyrics, and it took him a while to realize the banging sound wasn’t a drumbeat, but the door. He tried a quick trio of notes, hoping Micky would answer it. The angle of the bandstand didn’t give them a clear view of the doorway, but he seemed to be dealing with whoever was on the step.

“ _Micky!_ ” Micky called, his voice a breathless yelp.

“ _You’re_ Micky,” Mike shouted back. “You mean me, Mike?”

“Other one!” Micky sounded strangled, and they both tried to peer over.

“Me?” Pete asked.

“ _Yes!”_ This came as a hiss. “There’s a chick here for Peter! Not a chick—a lady!”

 “Oh, you ruined the setup,” came a female voice, now inside the pad. “At least, I assume you were going for the old “that’s no lady, that’s his wife’ joke?”

“Because Peter’s wife’s here!” cried Micky, his voice now a high-pitched squeak.

“Oh, what is this ‘Peter’s wife’? I thought Davy was the one with the crazy fans!” Mike scoffed. Although Peter gained more with each gig. “Pete… _Peter?_ ”

Peter, guitar down, was leaping over the chaise and a table in his haste to get to the door. “ _Zizi!_ ” he exclaimed.

By the time Mike got there, Peter was hugging the woman. “Zizi!” he said again, kissing her.

She was too small for Mike to see—all he could see were her arms hugging Peter back. Her arms and her hands, the fourth finger of the left one bearing a gold band. _A wedding ring_ _._


	3. Chapter Three

Peter’s _wife?_ Peter’s _married?_ No. Can’t be. _It’s a mistake. A gag._ Some joke he has going with this…Zizi? _She doesn’t look like a Zizi_ , came Mike’s jumbled, tumbling thoughts when the two broke apart and he could see her. Nothing _like a Zizi in that boxy-looking skirt and blazer suit, with her hair rolled up like that._

“You’re the only one that calls me that,” the brunette remarked. She nodded at Mike and Micky. “My name’s Elizabeth.”

“Knew it!” Mike was horrified to realize he’d said out loud. His scrambled brain tried to get a grip on his tongue and couldn’t. “Howdy! Well, come on in and sit a spell! Wife, not wife, Zizi, Elizabeth—makes no odds. Can’t stand in a doorway, as we say where I’m from. I’m a Texan, ya’ see, ma’am, and— _Ooof_!”

He turned to glare at Micky, who’d whacked him between the shoulder blades.

“Sorry, Mikey, old sport. Just thought you’d gotten jammed there and I was trying to help.” Micky’s grin almost made his squashed face fill out. Mike made _his_ face promise retribution. Glaring had made him miss an exchange as Peter ushered the woman in.

“I hadn’t planned to. Bit of an impulse decision. Just a quick stopover.”

“Well, it’s good to see you!” Peter turned back to them. “This is—”

“Mike and Micky.” She held out a hand and first Micky and then Mike shook it. “And I guess I’m Zizi. Makes me feel young again. Elizabeth, in full.”

 _She’s hardly old._ Mike tried to work out the age of the not that tall, bit underweight woman, and also direct a black look a Peter for an explanation. When that didn’t work, he had no choice but to interrupt Peter asking about some friends.

“So, ma’am, you said you were—”

“Oh, not to be gauche, but I really need the ladies’ room.” Elizabeth made an agonized face.

“Oh, of course.” Peter waved a hand. “The bathroom’s through there.”

“Bathroom…oh, I’d love a shower. Not to be a pain, but is there enough hot water?” she asked.

“Sure.” Peter ushered her in. He looked at her bag, basically a shoulder bag. “Do you need—”

“Not to impose, but if I could just borrow…” floated back to Mike and Micky where they stood staring after the visitor and Peter.

“Peter!” stage-whispered Micky as Peter shot past them, into the No-Room, the downstairs closet. “What—”

“One second!” He reappeared soon enough with a pair of jeans and a shirt and vanished into the bathroom with them.

“Could I borrow some of this dandruff shampoo?” was heard over the sound of the running water, as the door opened.

“Borrow—she gonna put it back in the bottle after?” muttered Mike, owner of the shampoo in question.

“I’ll get you a new bottle,” Elizabeth called back, before Peter came out, shutting the bathroom door behind him.

“Peter, what in the living fuck?” Mike burst out. “Who is she?”

“Elizabeth Carrol.”

The way he said the name, Mike could tell it was supposed to mean something.

So did Micky. “Oh, Elizabeth Carrol, the…” And he scrunched up his face and snapped his fingers as if trying to place the reference, which quickly turned into him scatting a jazz number. “And this one’s called ‘Ma sugar’s got some ’splaining to do-whop, to do-whop or he ain’t getting no sugar tonight, do-whop, do-do-whop.’ Thank you very much, I’m here all week, folks.”

Peter laughed and mimed playing some chords to accompany Micky. “I couldn’t tell you she was coming because I didn’t know.”

“That’s hardly the issue is it? Don’t play d—games. _Wife?_ How can you have a _wife_ , Peter _?_ ”

“I’m no scholar, but my best guess is they got married.” For some reason this was delivered in Micky’s Groucho Marx voice, complete with mannerisms.

“Peter, I’m trying to keep my cool here, but the longer I wait for an explanation, the madder I’m getting.”

“And not in a good way?” Peter took in Mike’s expression and dropped the levity. “Michael, cool it. I’m sure I told you.”

“Cool nothing. I think I’d have damn well remembered if you had! I’m pretty sure I’d remember that I’m involved with a married man!”

 “Hey, fellas.”

Mike almost jumped as Davy came in and walked though the middle of them. He stopped and looked from Mike to Peter. “What?”

“Davy! Now, I know you want a cup of tea. But you can’t run the water, because someone’s taking a shower!” Micky grabbed Davy and spun him to face the bathroom as if he could see through the door.

Davy looked from Peter to Mike, then Micky, then himself and counted on his fingers as he did so. “But we’re all here.”

“Someone _else_ is in the shower!” Micky clarified.

“Right.” Denied tea, Davy bent to look in the icebox for a drink.

“Don’t you wanna know who?”

“Oh! Gotcha.” Davy straightened. “Sorry, I’m a bit slow. Not much sleep.” No one asked him where he’d been, or what or who he’d been doing, so he continued, “Okay. My turn? Is it the Lord Privy Seal of the Labour Government, who took office November 1964?”

“ _What?_ ” Micky exploded

“We’re playing Botticelli, right?” Davy grabbed an apple. “I was trying to stump you so I could ask a direct question,” came thickly around a mouthful of fruit.

“Oh yeah!” Peter took the apple and helped himself to Mike’s penknife to slice the fruit for Davy. “I haven’t played in years! You have to ask questions to guess who someone’s thinking of. Like the name says. So you ask something like—”

“Is it an Italian painter of the Early Renaissance.” Davy said his thanks and picked a slice of apple from the paper plate.

“And then the person has to know who you mean and say, no, it’s not Botticelli. And if they don’t have any idea who you mean, you get a question.” Peter wiped the knife clean and Mike snatched it back from him, shoving it deep into his pocket.

“So, is it the current Lord Privy Seal of the Labour Government?” Davy asked Micky again.

“I don’t have any idea what the two of you are talking about!” Micky almost jumped up and down. Mike felt like joining him.

“It’s the Earl of Longford. Means I get a question.” Davy crammed the last slice of apple in. “Is it a woman?”

“ _It’s Peter’s wife!_ ” Micky yelled.

“Huh. Shortest game ever and I don’t think you understood the rules.” Davy wiped his hands on the dishcloth.

“No, it’s really Peter’s wife!” Micky pointed from Peter to the bathroom, where the sounds of the hairdryer could be heard.

 _My hairdryer_ , Mike fumed.

“Oh, Elizabeth from New York?” Davy asked.

“Elizabeth from— Just how many wives have you got stashed around the country, Peter? What the hell are you, a Mormon?” Mike yelled. “And I’m still waiting to know why you never said nothing about it.” And, oh God, Peter went back to the Village a couple times a year, if not more. To visit her? Stay with her? They seemed close—sleep with her?

Davy’s, “He told me,” bounced against Peter’s, “I even mentioned it this morning.”

“That’s—” Mike shut up as the woman exited the bathroom. Dressed in jeans she’d rolled up so they didn’t trail—she couldn’t have been more than five-six—and a shirt tied in a knot around her waist, her light-brown hair loose and damp, in long, layered bangs, yeah, she looked like a Zizi. _And Peter's type._

“That’s better. Hi,” she said to Davy. “Davy, right?”

“That’s right, luv. Wanna cuppa?” He filled the kettle at the same time as shaking her outstretched hand.

“This time of the evening?” she asked.

Mike suddenly became aware that they were all standing in a huddle between the kitchen and the bathroom and that it looked weird. _Huh._ That was weird? He tried to steer the party over to the chairs, but no one budged. He scowled at Peter.

“Anytime! I’m English, you see,” Davy answered.

“And do you put the milk in first?”

“I’m not upper-class English,” Davy replied. “And do you know, I dunno why they do?”

“Oh, because traditionally they used very fine bone china cups, that hot liquid might shatter, so the milk going in first cooled everything down.”

“Huh.” Davy nodded. “Interesting. We’re out of milk, anyway.”

“Are you staying for dinner?” Peter asked, leading the woman to a chair and sitting on the arm.

 _Oh, now they move!_ Mike followed, shrugging at Micky.

Elizabeth dug in her bag for a hairbrush. “Whose turn is it to cook?”

Micky held up a hand. “Guilty as charged.”

“Hmm, well…how about we bring pizza night forward? I’ll buy,” Elizabeth said.

“For everyone?” Mickey demanded.

“Yes of course.”

“I’ll go and slave over a hot telephone!” Micky bounced off.

“Ma’am, I’m mighty confused.” Mike couldn’t wait any longer, He sank onto the coffee table in front of her. “You see, I had no idea Peter was married. And we—”

“Mike, cool it. We’re not really married. It’s not a real marriage.” Peter shook his head. “I mean, it wasn’t consummated.”

“Yes, it was,” Elizabeth told him.

“Oh, you mean when we… The… Well, yeah, then. What I mean is, it was an arranged marriage.” He smiled.

“Like royalty?” Davy asked. “To cement an alliance or a treaty?”

“Why are you so goddam British this evening?” burst from Mike.

“Do you like sausage, Zizi?” Micky called from the phone. “Spicy sausage? Like pepperoni? On your pizza?”

Mike…wanted to hit Micky. And Peter. Mostly Peter. And then Davy. Just because.

“I think what you mean is, it was a marriage of convenience.” Elizabeth patted Peter’s arm.

“Like some sorta shotgun wedding?” Mike had to ask, staring hard at Peter. That face might look innocent but Mike knew—

“Yes, _exactly_. Look.” She pulled a photograph from her purse and held it out to Mike and Davy, who came to join them.

“Look how much shorter Pete’s hair was!” Davy commented.

Elizabeth looked a fair bit younger too. “That’s a pretty living room,” Mike said. He looked at the tableau, at the black-robed, Bible-holding man who was part of it. “And that one there’s your father, the tall man with…the actual shotgun.”

“Yes, his Beretta Silver Pigeon double-barreled.” Elizabeth nodded. “Shotgun wedding, hence Peter’s nickname in the Village.”

“ _Shotgun_ was because of… You…” Mike felt faint. Peter had never said! Not one goddam word!

“Oh, Pete _offered_.” Elizabeth said it as though that made things better.

Mike stood, his heart in his mouth. “Yeah, I guess he did the right thing.” He backed up a step. Couldn’t stay. Not—

Davy caught up, his eyes rounding and his mouth dropping open. “You mean you were…that you two have a—”

“ _No._ ” Peter shut down Davy’s line of questioning.

“But you thought you were.” Mike swallowed.

“Mike?” God knew what Peter saw in his face to stand and reach for him. Mike sidestepped.

“Well, that’s what I told my parents. That I thought I was.” Elizabeth nodded her thanks at Davy as she took her tea. “I mean, it wasn’t a lie—I can _think_ a lot of things.”

It sounded rehearsed, practiced. As though she’d used that line to convince… _Peter_? “But you got married!” he managed, staring at Peter.

“I needed a husband, yes.”

“Wouldn’t have thought you were an old maid on the shelf, luv,” came Davy’s comment. “You were what, sixteen?”

“Just turned.” Elizabeth put her cup down and stretched, her back cracking. “But Peter’s never told you? And I’m not explaining it well, am I. Maybe I’d better start at the beginning.”

“Like, where did you two meet?” Micky, his ‘cooking’ duties over, bounded up, holding out an imaginary microphone.

“Band camp,” Peter said. “We both played the French horn.”

“Peter tied my pigtails to the back of my chair,” Elizabeth reminisced.

“And Zizi punched me in the face,” Peter added.

“Yeah?” Mike sat, determined to get to the bottom of things, and glowered at Peter. “I believe there’s a lot of that goin’ around.”


	4. Chapter Four

Mike forced his hand not to shake as he handed Elizabeth back her photograph. _Huh._ Nice wedding photo. _Wedding. Married._ Okay, Peter might have mentioned it that morning, but Mike was damn sure that was the first he’d ever heard about it. He racked his brains, trying to remember if Peter had ever alluded it, when he was drunk, or stoned, say, or during the course of some stupid drinking game, but came up blank. And yet Davy knew? Well, they have shared a room until recently. Stood to reason confidences would get exchanged. But Peter had never worn a ring, as long as Mike had known him, and this woman did. So were they still—

“And I walked into a coffee house one summer lunchtime in the Village and Peter was playing.”

“The French horn?” queried Micky, imitating it.

“The banjo. And I was fuming!”

“He’s not that bad!”

Mike glared at Davy, then Micky. Heckle and Jeckle could go f— “Did he pass a basket around after?” he asked despite himself. Peter’s life before LA, playing for food and tips in Greenwich Village cafes and restaurants, fascinated him.

“His banjo!” Elizabeth answered. “And he came to say hi, after. I was surprised he remembered me. My hair had almost grown back, so I guess that helped. I was exploring, feeling rebellious.”

“The area, she means,” Peter said, in the pause this caused. “The Village. So we had lunch and got talking.”

_And got married. Some lunch. Some talk._ Mike had known, of course he had, that Peter had been with girls. Had been surprised to learn he’d been with guys. But maybe Peter…preferred women. Would, sooner or later, want to be with one. And then Mike— He reared back as Elizabeth stood.

“Sorry, I have to lean against the wall and crack my back. Don’t listen.”

Of course they did, and watched as she stood with her back to the wall, stretched her arms to lay her palms on the plaster and walked her hands down, until they were flat on the floor and she was bent into a hoop. Mike winced at the almighty crack and hoped it wasn’t the wall.

“Getting up’s the ugly part,” came her voice and she rolled over into a heap and stood, slowly. “May I look around? It’s so eclectic.”

“ _Eclectic?_ ” Micky mouthed.

“ _A five-cent word for jumble,_ ” Mike mouthed back.

Elizabeth wandered around, exclaiming or asking questions about their various bits o’stuff or _objet d’art_ , as she called them.

“Ah, that must be polite for junk.” Micky nodded.

“Oh, your wood sculpture!” she exclaimed, pointing to a rectangle of multicolored squares carved in wood and swivelling back to Peter. “Was that the project you got the good grade on?”

He joined her. “Yes! Got extra points for painting it.”

Mike…hadn’t known Peter had made that colorblock thing. “In grade school?” he asked, finding he was by Peter’s side.

Peter shook his head. “College. Freshman year.”

“Which one?” Mike asked. Peter had had two, one after the other, then gotten no further. Shame unfurled in Mike at bringing it up.

“What a lovely place.” Elizabeth revolved, taking it all it. “It’s post-post-modern, really. I wonder if that’s a style? But it works so well. There’s such a _leit-motif_ of warmth and life.”

“Thanks?” Mike narrowed his eyes, but she seemed genuine, peering at things and stroking others, as if she was in a gallery, or toy shop.

 “Coo, you’re dead brainy, you are,” came Davy’s assessment of Elizabeth.

“She’s a genius, technically. That what she was fuming about.”

“Right…” Micky replied to Peter. “Yeah, my off-the-charts smarts puts me in a bad mood too, gosh darn it.”

“As soon as the food arrives, I’ll explain,” Elizabeth promised. “I think I’m too hungry to make sense without it.”

“Peter’s like that,” Micky sympathized. “We think he must have been hungry for years— _Oww!_ ” He’d failed to duck Mike’s slap to the back of his head.

It wasn’t long before they were all sitting in a circle on the sundeck around a tablecloth, with two large flat pizza boxes in the middle.

“Tell me you didn’t get two Micky specials!” Mike crossed his fingers as he opened the box nearest to him. No; relatively normal. “Elizabeth, you’d best have some of this one. Shouldn’t give you too much indigestion. And thank you for springing for this. The cold drinks and everything.” He glared at Micky, who’d gone overboard with the ordering. Micky raised a mock-innocent eyebrow back.

And the way the woman had borrowed clothes and shampoo, Mike had been kinda nervous she wouldn’t have any money, but she’d pulled a bundle of notes out of her bag when the delivery guy had arrived. Seemed she just traveled light.

“Oh, I’m sure it’s all good. Smells delicious. My father wouldn’t let me go to university.”

“Wh— Oh, You started. Right.” Mike poured Coke into everyone’s glass.

“He wanted me to go to finishing school!” came in an indignant huff before Elizabeth tried a slice of pizza with hotdogs, fried eggs and peaches. She paused to watch Micky slather maple syrup on his portion.

“In Switzerland?”

Elizabeth nodded at Davy. “I needed a signature on the admission papers because I was young and female. Same as when I wanted to rent an apartment. So I asked in the office at Barnard, Columbia, if anyone else could sign for me and they said—”

“Your husband.”

“Exactly.” Elizabeth reached for a slice of more normal pepperoni and mushroom pizza and brushed off the crumbled fish sticks. “Isn’t that just the most hidebound, antediluvian, patriarchal thing ever?” 

“Yes?” Micky shrugged in incomprehension.

“So, Peter happy to sign anything for me, we got married, took an apartment, I enrolled in the fall and Peter came here.”

“So your father gave you an allowance?” Because Mike couldn’t imagine Peter being able to fund any of that.

But no, Elizabeth inherited money from her grandmother, left to her for when she turned twenty-one or married, whichever came first, which had made her independent financially at least, for a while, at least, she explained.

“So you came with a dowry.” Davy nodded as though it were normal.

“So Peter got some nice pin money, and some alimony when you divorced, in the fall?” Micky rubbed his hands.

“Micky!” Mike scolded. Not that he hadn’t been wondering the same.

“Oh, we couldn’t divorce right away.”

“You have to be married for a year,” Peter added, offering a napkin in their silver diner holder to his…wife? Ex-wife? Mike was none the wiser. “And Elizabeth needed me. To sign more. Re-enrolment for one more year, then her Masters…” He glanced at Mike, sitting next to him and, after a few seconds, rubbed his bent knee against Mike’s. Mike gave the tiniest rub back.

“Didn’t you get _anything_?” Micky was at his most dog-with-bone-like. “Like, jewellery? An engraved cup?”

“I got the car.” Peter smiled. “It’s how I got here.”

“Didn’t you break down, abandon the car, and have to hitch the rest of the way?”

“I didn’t say it was a good car,” Peter answered Davy.

_Well, yeah._ Seemed very Peter. Although, helping the damsel in distress seemed more Davy-like. But not wanting anything for bailing someone out… _Peter at his finest._ Mike tried to feel positive but couldn’t stop himself. “So now you’re divorced?”

“I…” Peter looked across at Elizabeth. “I remember signing the papers for the Decree something. Twice?”

“Thanks.” Elizabeth took her refilled glass from Davy and downed half of it. Seemed she’d just discovered the bits of jalapeno pepper that tended to lurk under the mushrooms when Micky was in charge of the pizza. “The first decree then the Absolute, yes. Ages ago! I’ve got your copy safe. You need it to re-marry.”

There was an odd silence. Elizabeth looked from one face to another.

“What did you study?” Mike asked, his voice strangled.

“Oh, English, then Journalism.”

“And that’s what you do.” Davy fed his crust to Micky, who ate it from his palm like a pony, complete with whinny noise. Mike closed his eyes, but Elizabeth didn’t run screaming for the hills. Even so, he couldn’t see her as a reporter, tracking down a story on the mean streets. “Literary nonfiction. A kind of journalism,” Davy finished.

“You’ve read my… Oh. Peter mentioned it.” She grinned, and the piece of mushroom stuck in her teeth gave her the look of a pirate, with a tooth missing.

Peter leaned over the tablecloth, a napkin in his hand, then subsided back against Mike. “You’ve got a…” He gestured.

“Oh. Thanks.” Elizabeth contorted her tongue to deal with it.

“So you write? What about? I’m sorry I haven’t read any. Peter never mentioned it to me,” Mike said. _Any of it._

“Well, narratives. Factual narratives, using literary techniques, so they’re written to be entertaining, not dry or academic.”

“For magazines, right? Like _Vogue_?”

Trust Davy to know about magazines with fashion in.

“And I’ve sold pieces to _Life_ and _The Saturday Evening Post_ and was commissioned to write a series for _Esquire_. That was more critical journalism.” She explained about her essay on living religion, how she’d lived among the Amish in Pennsylvania, and her series on the boroughs of New York, how it was a perfect illustration of the evolution of the US, the country in microcosm. Oh, and she was just back from Mexico…

Mike couldn’t take much in. He couldn’t help wondering how Peter had reconciled everything. For a guy who prided himself on being honest and not using underhand tactics or playing head games, he’d kinda lied so a woman could, well, cheat her family and kick her father’s wishes to the wind.

“What did your parents say about it, Peter?” he suddenly asked. “The marriage, I mean. Sorry to interrupt.”

“Oh, it never came up.”

“Oh what is this 'it never came'— Of course it wouldn’t, in that I doubt most people’s parents don’t open a conversation with, ‘Hey son, did you happen to have gotten married since we last spoke?’ But it’s big. Or I would’ve thought so. And Elizabeth still wears a ring!”

“Here. This might cool you down.” Micky dipped a napkin in the soda and flicked a little at Mike.

“I’m keeping an account of how much of a pain you’re being this evening,” Mike muttered. “Don’t think I ain’t.”

“It’s easier to be known as a married woman, professionally.” Elizabeth inhaled and exhaled slowly, but not peacefully, like Peer doing yoga. “I know what you’re thinking. A betrayal of the sisterhood. Of womanhood. That I have to present myself as an appendage, an adjunct in someone else’s narrative. Life, even. That the only way to have my own agency is through a fictive device.”

“I’m pretty sure none of us were thinking those words.” Micky of course.

“I don’t mean to be hypocritical. Just, life, you know?”

_Life’s not fair for women._ Mike recalled Lola saying that, a few weeks ago.

“Would anyone like to take a walk along the beach? I never see the sea.”

“Sure, and you could have visited anytime,” Mike pointed out, standing when Elizabeth did. _If we’d known about you._

“I’ve been a little busy launching a career and— Oh!” burst from Elizabeth. “I get it! You’re together! Finally! Oh, I’m so happy for you! May I?”

“May—” He didn’t get the chance to ask before she hugged them both.

“Would it be awkward to ask about it?”

“ _Yes,_ ” he replied, and she laughed.

“Not out of journalistic curiosity, but out of prurient interest?”

“Still yes,” Mike said, even without knowing what she meant.

“As long as we’re back for _Get Smart_.” Davy glanced at his watch, ushering Elizabeth down the steps to the sand.

“And the movie’s on at nine,” Micky added.

They walked a while, with Elizabeth asking him about the differences he’d found moving from Texas to LA and Davy about his experiences in the States. Mike had forgotten Davy had lived in New York for a while. His hand brushed Peter’s and Peter looked around at the other beachgoers, then clasped his. Mike squeezed back.

“She’s great, isn’t she.” Peter swung their joined hands to point at Elizabeth, walking ahead with the kids.

“I guess, yeah. She was cool about us, and all.” Mike’s head was swirling with all that had happened, all he’d learned, all that had been said. Some parts he’d set aside to examine later, but couldn’t recall them, not now. Not pizza-heavy and soda-full, slow in the slanting light of the beach and the shush of the surf, with Peter close to him, his hand in Mike’s.

They started back, everyone a little sluggish, and in the pad, Micky and Davy squabbled for TV chairs. Elizabeth took the sofa, and her eyes were closing within a minute. Peter looked at Mike, one side of his mouth hitching up in a smile. “She falls asleep anywhere, in no time.”

“Seems we have a guest, then.”

“And…it’s okay?”

“This is, yeah.” Mike knew the rules of hospitality. He twitched the blanket over Elizabeth. “I think _we_ have some talking to do.”

“Talk…tomorrow.” Elizabeth half-sat and made a sleepy grab for Peter’s hand, perhaps locating his position via his voice. “Because I have a big favor to ask you.”

“Anything. You know that.” Peter settled a pillow under her head and she fell back down, asleep. “You don’t have to ask.”

He straightened, to face Mike. “Michael?” he asked, searching his face, a face Mike knew reflected his feelings.

He couldn’t believe Peter would make such a blind, all-encompassing offer. “And that, right there, is more talking we have to do,” he said.


	5. Chapter Five

 “Sure, Michael.”

The look on Peter’s face tore Mike up. He sighed. “I’m trying to process all this new information, okay? I’m not mad at you. Really, I’m not.”

“Just disappointed.”

“ _No._ In you, _never_.” He reached out to stroke Peter’s cheek. Neither of them could go long without touching the other. Not caring that the other two could turn around and see, he drew his thumb along Peter’s lips, needing the contact, the intimacy. He’d figure out Pete’s reasons for not talking about Elizabeth. _About being married. And divorced._ He must have had them, and good ones too.

Heat flared in Peter’s eyes and he parted his lips a little, but didn’t draw Mike’s thumb into his mouth. Of the two of them, he was more careful about them not showing their affection and closeness in public. Mike, cautious by nature, did his part too, of course, but Peter swamped his senses.

“Look, we can talk about it later, or maybe tomorrow, when we know the favor Elizabeth wants, huh? In the meantime, wanna blow this popsicle stand?”

Mike’s thumb rubbed over Peter’s lips as Peter gave an eager nod. It made Mike grin. “Micky, you’re on clean-up fatigues, right?”

“At the commercial break,” Micky agreed.

“Remember we have a visitor, guys. Perhaps don’t both go out, so she doesn’t wake up alone and confused about where she is?” Mike thought better. “Or, if you do, at least leave her a note right next to her?”

“Where you going?” Micky scrambled around in his chair to see him.

“I’m gonna take Peter out of this Monkee house for a while.”

“I spy Inspiration Point! Someone’s getting lucky.” Micky rubbed his hands and stuck out his tongue.

“Mick, the way you’re so interested in what these two get up to, sounds like _you’re_ the one in need of some action.”

“Aww, thanks, that’s so sweet of you!” Micky patted Davy’s hand. “And while I love you as a friend, you’re not really my type. Although…I could stretch a point? Well, I’d have to stretch…something—”

Davy got in one good wallop and one filthy name-call at Micky before Mike got behind their chairs, a hand around each of their heads and his head between theirs. “That coulda been me banging your fool heads together!” he warned them. “Watch your mouths. There’s a lady present.”

“That’s no lady; that was his wife!” Micky crowed in triumph, his holler making Elizabeth twitch and mutter in her sleep.

Mike walked around to the front of the guys, standing between Micky and the TV. “So, you finally got your gag in. Feel better?”

“Yes. A little.” Micky held up his thumb and forefinger to show the amount. “Where you going?” he demanded again.

“For a drive, is all you need to know.” Mike half-turned. “If Peter would do me the honor of accompanying me?”

“Sure! I’ll get changed.” He bounced to the closet.

“It’s not fair! You live with your best friend, who you love, who you’re dating—who you’re in love with!” Micky looked as surprised as Davy and Mike did at the wail that had burst from him. He clapped a hand over his mouth.

 _Enough’s enough._ Mike dropped to his knees in front of Micky. He yanked Micky’s hand from his mouth and leaned forward until he was nose-to-snub-nose with his bandmate. His roommate. His friend. “Tomorrow. You, me. Outside. Breakfast, brunch, lunch, ice cream on the beach, picnic on a hike, drink in a club, dinner in a diner—I don’t care. But we are talking this through from beginning to end, step by step by step.” He leaned back on his heels and stared hard into Micky’s almond eyes.

“I… Okay.” Micky gave a tiny nod.

“Good.” Mike squeezed Micky’s knees as he stood. He’d drag Mick by the ear into the Duke Box or to Lola’s apartment and make him apologize, if that was what it would take. Mike had no idea what was going on, or what had gone on, or had gone wrong, more likely, but he’d bet anything Micky could stand to apologize. _In general._ He raised a stern eyebrow at Davy, in case the li’l biscuit got any ideas about razzing either of them, but Davy gave a half-nod too.

Micky’s muted wolf-whistle had Mike turning. His tongue hung out at the sight of Peter in tight-fitting light-colored pants, a paisley shirt, and a dark vest.

“Babe…Peter… _sugar_ …” was all Mike could manage, especially when Peter adjusted the string of love beads Mike had given him for a morning-after present, after their first time.

“Hmm?” came Peter’s nonchalant reply.

“ _Sugar…_ ” Mike pinched his lips together in case any stray drool escaped. Because Peter sure made his mouth water.

“Oh, now look what you did. You broke Mike!” Micky scolded. “And funny, I’m the one with all the acting experience, yet you know _way_ more about costumes.”

“What?” Peter’s puzzled frown and mock-innocence fooled no one. He bent over and scooped up his acoustic guitar.

“And now for the talent portion of the competition…” came in Micky’s best announcer voice.

“I’m gettin’ changed too,” Mike announced, mainly to irritate Micky, striding for the downstairs closet.

What would Peter like him in? _Those slouchy buckskin boots, for sure. And jeans, with a belt with a big buckle. That salmon-colored shirt with pearl buttons. No tie._ He shrugged into a denim jacket on the way out to where Peter was waiting.

“ _Oh._ ” Micky blew out air. “I thought for sure Pete’d have gotten you into one of his orange peril sweaters by now!”

“This is about as orange as I’ll go. For now.” It was Peter’s shirt. Mike had never seen Micky wear it, unlike the darker pink open-neck one Micky and Peter shared. Oh. Peter had said something about Mike stealing Peter’s clothes like chicks did. He scowled. “And I’m not the goddam chick.”

“No. There she is,” quipped Davy, indicating Elizabeth.

“You look good,” Peter told him.

“And here we have a rare sight in captivity, a hippy and a cowboy seen together,” came in hushed BBC commentator tones from a certain drummer. “And the cowboy is a real-life native of the Lone Star state, ladies and gentlemen, and actually wearing a Texas tuxedo!”

“I am not. I’m wearing double demin. A Texas tuxedo is jeans, an actual tux jacket, white shirt, bolo tie and Stetson. Really!” Mike assured them.

“That…sounds… _nice_.” Peter’s eyes were as dreamy as his voice, so Mike hustled him out of the door quickly, stopping only to grab the car keys, before any fantasy formed and was, _dear God_ , witnessed or, _Lord have mercy_ , shared.

“Do you want to drive?” Mike tossed over the keys, calling, “Shotgun!” out of habit. He had to laugh. “Shotgun. I guess that is pretty funny, yeah.”

“Oh, you fancy a turn in the passenger seat?” Peter licked his lips. “I’ll remember that for later.”

Mike laughed again, then chuckled when Peter pretended he was putting his arm around him while he drove. “Cut that out—the Monkeemobile doesn’t come with a necker’s knob!”

“A what?”

“You know, the knob guys put on the steering wheel so they can drive with one hand and have the other free for…other stuff.”

“A brodie knob?”

“Also called a suicide knob, here in California. Not surprised.” Not with these narrow, winding coast roads. Not like Texas roads. “Yeah, don’t think we’ll be fitting one to the Mobile.”

They headed for Mulholland and the scenic overlook they’d discovered last week. The LA panorama from the Valley to the ocean was just lights and shapes, this time of night, but the people hanging out there were cool and there was a camp fire and some of the guys played or made music. It was mellow…and tolerant. Laid-back, no hang-ups on display. Mike grabbed his coat from the backseat and they walked to the fire, greeting folk they'd seen before.

“ _Hey!_ ”

A guy Mike didn’t know snatched the book Dean was trying to read by fire and torch light and Mike tensed, first at that and then at the robber guy accusing Dean of being antisocial, of ignoring them.

“Well hell, yeah; it’s his new one! I just got it!” Dean protested, pointing at the book, and the thief turned it to see the cover. Mike couldn’t make it out.

“Oh wow! I didn’t know it was out—will you be done soon? Can I get it after you? I groove on those!” the guy exclaimed, dropping to sit next to Dean.

‘“So long, slick,’” said Dean

‘“Far out, man,’” the guy replied and Mike wondered what they were quoting.

Mike sat against a fallen log, not far from the fire, and waited for Peter to settle sideways in the gap Mike’s bent legs made. Here there was no need to check no one was watching, even if Mike had had to stop himself gawping like a hick last week. Now, he pulled Peter into his chest and wrapped his sheepskin coat around him. Peter ran a hand down Mike’s thigh. He liked Mike’s long legs. Mike kissed the top of Peter’s head.

“Get it over with,” came muffled.

“I ain’t gonna lecture or sermonize. I guess you did it with good motives.” As usual with them, there was no need for preamble or filling in the gaps.

“I still owe her. For the scalping.”

“ _What?_ ”

“When I tied her hair to her chair. I was practicing my knots. You know I was a Scout?” Peter raised his head. “It was the only badge I got. They had to cut her free. Cut her hair shorter.”

“Oh. And how did she take that? Another punch to the face?”

“No. She kicked me in the nads.”

Mike groaned in sympathy. “I’m still not sure why you didn’t ever mention it. Being married, I mean. Not the kick to the nads. That I can see you’d wanna keep quiet about.”

“Ha-ha. I guess I never thought of it as a marriage. More like housemates. Friends. There were always people staying there—it seemed part of that.”

 _Except you consummated it._ But Mike wouldn’t ask. Wouldn’t want Peter to tell. _Well…_ “Okay, but that was the past.” Mike settled the coat more firmly around them. “Things are different now. You have other loyalties.” He kept the rebuke as mild as he could.

“Yes. I understand that. I’m sorry.”

“And you have no idea what the favour is? Oh, _Jesus_.” A shiver ran through Mike. “What if, I mean, she doesn’t want children, does she?” The shiver became a tremor when Mike pictured a houseful of kids with her brains and Peter’s blond beauty…not that Elizabeth was bad-looking, and Peter was mighty smart. _Wow. What a match. They—_

“Again, you know I can see your fantasy?” What light there was showed Peter’s grin. “And no, she doesn’t. You heard her. She’s too busy and she travels a lot. She’s never been keen on children. Michael, is this you panicking?”

“No, no. This is me flustered. Panic’s a whole other thing.”

“I wouldn’t worry. She’s probably traded the Village loft for a townhouse and needs painting and decorating done.” Peter settled down again, his back to Mike’s chest. He dug in the coat pocket for Mike’s harmonica.

“Hmm. New York might be fun.”

Peter shifted, innocently enough—perhaps—and Mike couldn’t prevent his automatic reaction. He listened to Peter blow a scale on the harmonica then join in with the guitar someone was strumming near the fire. Huh. Peter was much better.

Peter played along with a few more songs. He couldn’t not. It was good to be together outside. But they were lucky. They lived together, were hitched but not churched, as folks said back home. He pressed his smile into the back of Peter’s head, making Peter turn to him once more. “Talking of, come on. Take me home and—”

“Fuck you?” Peter said, his smile and voice angelic, his words devilish.

“No. Make love to me. Yeah, I’m a softy. But I’m getting harder by the minute.”

“I love you too.” When Mike furrowed his brow, Peter added, “That’s belated, from this morning.”

“Oh. Tell me later.”

Peter did. Mike liked to be told that, often.

* * * *

But the next morning, he had to ask Elizabeth to repeat herself, too. “Say that again?” he begged, trying to drag her attention from the figures in the Hollywood Wax Museum she’d insisted on visiting. Mike had never been there either—it had only opened earlier that year—but could have lived without it. “I don’t think I heard right.”

Elizabeth stepped back from what the label said was Marilyn Monroe and dropped her hand from the figure’s diamond necklace.

“I said, I want Peter to impersonate me,” she repeated.


	6. Chapter Six

“Pete impersonate you?” Micky spun around from his detailed, minute examination of James Cagney. “Hey, I still got the dress from when I dressed as a woman! He’d need a new wig because Elizabeth’s got longer hair than Mrs. Arcadian.” He frowned. “I never really liked that name? Mike just gave it to me. Just like that.”

“You dress as a woman? And Mike assigned you a feminine name?” Elizabeth was narrow-eyed and her fingers slid a pen from her pocket.

“Oh, just because Davy wanted it.”

“It was at a party! He dressed as a female chaperone!” Mike yelped, his forehead sweating as a group of young girls turned around from the Teen Idols podium.

“So, at a ‘party’ you dressed as a female authority figure to please Davy and Mike chose—”

“Ma’am, _please_ ,” Mike begged when Elizabeth pulled a reporter’s notepad from her bag. “Can we discuss more important things?”

“Hey, there’s Frankie Catalina!” Peter observed.

“Oh, that’s right!” Micky dashed over, calling over his shoulder, “You know, I heard somewhere he can’t really surf?”

“That would be crazy.” Peter indicated the tableau, set up like a beach, complete with Annette Funicello.

“Peter…” Mike breathed heavily. “Going back to what Elizabeth just said. Do you know what she means?” Because the woman in question was tutting at the Blonde Bombshells podium rather than supplying an explanation.

Peter shook his head. “Rarely.”

“That’s because I’ve started in the wrong place for a linear account.” Elizabeth drifted back. “I started _in media res_. That’s what makes my narrative writing so intriguing.”

“You’re not writing now,” Mike pointed out, standing right in front of her so she stepped backward and the backs of her knees banged into a sofa, making her sit. He dropped down next to her.

“Mike’s gettin’ a li’l bowed up,” Peter said, sitting on Elizabeth’s other side.

 _Yeah. I am._ Mike took a deep, cleansing breath to beat back the irritation riding him, then shot Peter a sharp look. That hadn’t been a good imitation, for all it had used one of the Texanisms Peter liked to hear.

“I’d better start with a confession,” Elizabeth said.

“Well, it is Sunday.” Micky passed them on his way to where effigies of the Rat Pack lounged in a night club, possibly one in Hollywood itself.

“Except this ain’t no church.” Mike crossed his arms.

“My money was running out.”

“Wh— I wish you’d say when you were starting. Go on?” Mike invited Elizabeth.

“So I started writing books. Not the sort of thing I was hoping to write, that I was beginning to be known for, but a commercial, market-friendly genre designed to make money. Fiction, of no literary merit. Well, obviously the latter is debatable…”

She sat without saying anything more, and neither Mike nor Peter interrupted. In the silence that followed, a couple came up and stared at them.

“Honey, who do you think they’re supposed to be?” the woman enquired of the man. She gazed from Elizabeth to Mike on one side of her and Peter on the other. “Something…European? _French?_ ”

“Can’t see a label…” He peered. “But they’re more lifelike than any of the others so far.”

“Hey, I ain’t no dummy!” Mike cried, and the man jumped a foot into the air clutching his chest.

“We’d better walk,” Peter suggested, when he’d stopped laughing.

“Yeah, the Small Screen room is this way.” Micky pointed. “Whaddid I miss?”

“That Elizabeth writes popular fiction books.” Peter caught him up.

“Oh? About what?”

“A private investigator,” came the author’s surprising reply. “In New York.”

“Ah, the City of Dreams, the City That Never Sleeps, the City So Nice, They Named it Twice.” Micky nodded.

“A series of books. Right.” Mike felt they were getting somewhere. “Yeah, all that hard-boiled gumshoe stuff is popular, I guess.” It had been when he was growing up. “And you lived in NY all your life? You must know it well, to write the background. And they sell okay? You do all right from them?”

“Well, yes.” She didn’t look too happy about it. Mike exchanged a glance with Peter over her head, easy to do when she was a lot smaller than them. Huh, Mike kinda had a weakness for the tiny-teeny type with long flowing hair, especially if they were 'arty; in any way. Seemed Peter did too, only he tended to prefer the more offbeat ones. _Figures._

“Is that how you finance the kind of writing you prefer doing?” Mike tried, waving over at Micky to signal _yes_ , they’d be over to see whatever Western TV series was being displayed there that was enthralling Micky. He wished Davy were there, to keep Micky company.

Elizabeth nodded.

“They pay better than your intellectual stuff.” Mike thought he got it. “So where does Peter—”

“My agent and publisher said right at the start that readers only buy this genre if it’s written by a man. So I adopted a male _nome de plume_. And yes, I understand that once again I’m betraying—”

“ _Elizabeth._ ” Mike pinched the bridge of his nose. “Where does P—”

“I’m up for an award. No; two. At this year’s Crime and Detective Writers of America presentation ceremony. One for the latest book in the series and one for the protagonist, a sort of overall award in the private detective category. My publisher thinks I’m going to win.” She covered her face.

Mike nudged her to keep walking, and when she took her hands away, she jumped to see waxworks of JFK and Jackie Kennedy in front of her.

“And you have to accept the award in person? Else it would seem, what, a snub?” Peter asked.

“And that would lose you sales?” Mike added.

“Lose me a publisher!” Elizabeth wailed. “He told my agent flat-out. And I have to write a few more, at least, then I’ll be set enough to stop and focus on my real writing.”

Mike’s stomach sank and dark suspicions clouded his brain. “What had this got to do with P—”

“Only my agent knows my identity.” Elizabeth grabbed Peter’s arm. “It’s not crime to impersonate someone who doesn’t exist. No one has even seen him. He’s never so much as given an interview.”

“Who hasn’t?” Mike asked.

“Wade Thompson. My male alter ego. Wade is my mother’s maiden name, and Thompson’s—”

“Peter’s mother’s.” Mike ran his hand down Elizabeth’s arm so she dropped Peter’s.

“And…this is the photo on the back of the cover.” Elizabeth pulled a dust jacket out of her bag. It bore a blurb about Wade Thompson’s love of the New Yorkscape, its history, geography…biology and chemistry, for all Mike knew. He wasn’t looking at the words, but rather the picture. The black and white photo was small and not that clear, but it was of a very familiar man.

“Hey, that’s—” Micky, re-joining them, pointed from the picture to the original standing there with them.

“An old photo,” Peter said, his face creased in amusement.

Mike didn’t feel like laughing, either at that or at Micky’s enthusiasm for the cockamamie idea when brought up to speed again.

“Is there anything else you haven’t told us, ma’am?” Mike asked, his vision of the house full of children returning. Not a house full, but perhaps one, that she’d forgotten to mention…

“ _Mike,_ ” Peter reprimanded. “Elizabeth is asking for help to be able to continue making a living, to carry on doing the thing she loves.”

 _Put like that…_ Mike thought of their music, and how he’d feel if that was denied them. They’d all promised, right when they started the band and sharing a pad, that they wouldn’t work routine jobs and have music as a sideline. Vowed the band, their music would be their focus. Their all. He felt mean.

“So of course I’ll he—have to discuss it with Mike,” Peter told Elizabeth, moving to stand hip-to-hip with Mike.

 _And put like that…_ He felt like an ogre. “If you both think it’s the best thing to do, then I’m fine with it.” He even attempted a smile.

All three of the others looked surprised.

“Just like that? No argument?” Elizabeth queried.

“As we say back home, there's two theories to arguin' with a woman and neither one works.” Mike ushered them to the exit.

* * * *

“And I don’t want any argument, or backtalk, or sass from you,” he cautioned Micky when Peter dropped them off on Sunset on his way taking Elizabeth to the airport.

“Wasn’t talking supposed to be the point of this?” Micky’s quiet voice made Mike feel lower than a snake with bellyache.

“Yeah. Not one word about that crazy scheme Peter’s crazy ex is cookin’ up, I mean.” He wished he hadn’t felt he oughta say yes to it. He wished— “What is that smell? It’s…” He stopped and sniffed in the aroma. Steak, spices, proper thick French fries… He could even hear some country rock.

“What’s it smell like?”

“Home,” Mike answered without thinking. “Sounds like it too.”

“I bet.” Grinning, Micky opened the door to a small-looking bar.

“The Spur’n’Saddle?” Mike’s eyes were wide, taking in the wood-panel place with its booths, its cooking pit, its honky-tonk band on a stage… “Oh my Lord. There’s…” He stopped himself pointing. “Micky. Promise me right now you will not ride the mechanical bull, y’hear!”

“Can’t make any promises, Mikey.”

“And this is where you wanna eat?”

“Yeah. It’s new. I figured you’d like it. It’s got ribs. _Real_ ribs,” he said along with Mike, Mike’s voice a suspicious query, though.

“And the waitresses’ skimpy costumes don’t hurt, either,” Mike guessed, looking at the painted scenes of Western landscapes and the mounted longhorns on the wall, the photographs of famous Texans and the memorabilia scattered throughout. “C’mon. Let’s get a drink. And a plate of spicy wings.”

He waited until he and Micky were seated at a table, ribs ordered, a plate of rapidly vanishing appetizers in front of them and the illegal beer in Micky’s hand half gone before ordering him to talk.

“I guess you think I’m envious, or something.” Micky looked up through his unruly fringe. “But I’m happy for you and Peter.”

“You sure?”

“I am. But yeah, I’m envious. I do want what you have. Oh. Not _you_ , exactly. I don’t want _Peter_.”

Mike nodded and sipped his beer.

“I’d like that sort of relationship, though.”

“ _That_ , as in…” Mike raised an eyebrow.

“Oh, no, not… _that_.” Micky bent his head to select a wing and his voice came quieter. “Although I’m not saying I didn’t enjoy it.” He raised his head. “You did know…”

Mike nodded. He did now.

“It was just fooling around.”

“Wasn’t exactly _fooling_ , I bet.” What had Peter called all the touching and closeness between them? “Soothing.”

“Yeah, kind of.”

“Well, I hope _he_ didn’t take advantage of you if you came on to _him_ drunk.”

“No.” Micky’s memories of his past behaviour made him blush. “It was mutual. He was out of it too!”

“Does that make it better, or worse?” Mike pondered. “Well, whatever. No harm done, I guess. But past is past. Are we clear on that?”

“Yeah. And _we’re_ cool?”

“Yeah. Unless you go bed-hopping again when you’re blitzed.” Mike waited as the waitress set their ribs, sticky and sweet-smoky smelling, down between them. “And if you can’t make promises about being able to control yourself when you're wasted and horny and lonely, I’ll just lock the bedroom door.” Micky’s face made him laugh, and Micky joined in.

“Hey, look, that guy’s reading one of Elizabeth’s books!” Micky pointed to a guy a few tables over, whose book’s dust jacket looked familiar.

They both watched the guy stretch and place the book back on a small table, among a few others. “They seem to be part of the décor? But this is Texas themed, not New York?” Mike said.

“Strange. Excuse me, sir!” Micky called. “Sir, that book you just put back, can I ask why it’s in this place, when it’s about New York?”

“You’ve never read the _Lower Manhattan Casebook_ series.” The man chuckled. “The hero’s a Texan. A PI, a transplant in the capital. I was checking his chili recipe, in that book.” The guy picked up the book again and its cover bore a picture of a man with jet-black hair and a Stetson against the famous city skyline. “He says, ‘Hold the pinto beans—”’

“And don’t neglect the pineapple and chocolate,” Mike finished for him, slowly.

“Oh, you read it!” The guy put the book back.

“Nope.” Mike sat back, a tightness in his chest. That was his grandfather’s recipe and saying, word-for-word. The tightness gripped harder, heavy and ominous.


	7. Chapter Seven

“So, you know about me and Pete dicking around…”

“What? Oh, uh-huh.” Overcompensating for being distracted, Mike shoved his suspicions aside to focus on Micky, who needed him. He was glad to, happy to have something to pull him back.

“So…is Peter hip that you and I shared a bed more than once?”

“ _Micky—_ ” Mike broke off and assured the hovering server that everything was mighty fine, thank you. He met Micky’s eyes, trying to read his friend’s feelings in those only half-laughing brown depths. What was he supposed to say? He’d knocked Micky back whenever Micky’d attempted to crawl into Mike’s bed drunk or stoned, but when Micky had crept in needing comfort, Mike had let him stay. And sometimes—

He raised a reproving eyebrow at Micky. “Could you think of a faster way to get you to sleep, so _I_ could get some shut-eye? Guess you’ll have to make do with counting sheep now. And no. I didn’t tell Peter. I don’t kiss and tell.”

“Even if there wasn’t any kissing, and not much to tell?”

“ _Especially_ ,” Mike agreed. He tried the potato salad. He’d been wary of the herbs added but it was good, as was the amount of paprika he could taste in the dry rub on the ribs. He nudged the corn over to Micky. “Go on,” he encouraged, when Micky stayed silent. “I want you to talk everything through. Talk it all out.”

“It might not make much sense,” came from around a mouthful of potato and chives.

“I’m not gonna crack on that.” Mike couldn’t stop a grin, though. “Anything you wanna say, I’m listening.”

“I guess, seeing the both of you together, I got kinda hung up on it? Uptight about it? Oh, I’m groovy with it. For real. You know that. I can’t explain, but perhaps because it _was_ both of you? Or more, the thought of both of you? I don’t know. But I think I’ll miss being with you, you cuddling me. Holding me.”

Now what was he supposed to say? Offer to let Mick climb in between him and Peter when Micky was feeling lonely and needy? No. Mike was way too possessive of Peter. And coddling Micky, indulging him—it wasn’t good in the long run. _Proof’s right here._ At least he felt sure Micky wasn’t harboring feelings for Pete. Or Mike. Not romantic or sexual ones, anyway.

“I’m sorry,” he said, finally, meaning it. “Things change, and we have to adapt. But one thing that won’t is that I’ll always love you. Always look out for you.”

“That’s two things.” Micky held up a fork and spoon in illustration.

“Okay, so my poor math won’t change either. Which makes four things.” He waited for Micky to grin. “So you think you’re ready for a relationship?” Mike doubted it, thought Micky was just influenced by seeing him and Pete and by his own loneliness.

“Well, Lola didn’t. Told me I’d have to make more effort.” Micky, his ribs devoured even quicker than Mike’s, wiped his sticky fingers. “When we saw her on the Tuesday last week, when we were filling in for the Embrace, I told her she was welcome at the pad anytime, to come over and watch TV, or listen to music, like you and Peter do, and she said—”

“Micky, all that sitting quietly together and not doing much, that’s a whole other stage in a relationship!” Mike threw a picked-clean rib down onto his plate. “That’s when you know the other person’s soul and you just need to be close to them, because you feel half of yours is missing if not.”

“Wow, Mike, that’s like a poem!”

“Maybe you could write one for Lola.” Although Mike doubted the independent woman and Micky would make a good pair, not at this stage in both their lives. His suspicion grew stronger that Mick’s getting together with the chick at the same time as Mike and Peter had become a couple, with all the changes that had brought, had confused Micky.

“And you should go talk to her. Today.” Mike looked around, tracing the source of the fruit and sugar scent that was tantalizing him: dessert a few tables over. “Take her a slice of that key lime pie.”

“Why?”

“Why not? No reason. Just drop it in and say you were nearby and got to thinking about her and thought she’d like something for her break. I don’t know! Then ask if you can call her. Say you wanna to ask her to a movie Monday, her night off, but you realise that’s very short notice.”

“That’s tomorrow.”

“Yeah, I know. Which isn’t very polite of a gentleman. So tell her you want to take her out one day in the week.”

“Where? I don’t got much spare cash.”

True. And for once they weren’t paying off rent arrears, but their tab at the hardware store. Once more Mike wondered if having gotten Babbet to agree to a lower rent in exchange for them making their own repairs and improvements to the pad had been a good idea. It had seemed so, especially with them getting supplies on credit, promising to settle their account with their gig payments, but…

Mike thought back to growing up and dating without much of anything. “Well, ask if you can bring her out to the beach for a picnic lunch one day next week. And you’ll make sure she gets back to Sunset in time for work after. Oh, and you make the picnic, obviously.” He thought of Lola’s beehive hair-do—salt water and sand wouldn’t be kind to it. She’d have to fix herself up for the Duke Box. “And you’ll see that she has plenty of time to change after.”

It took a little more pep talking, and a little more listening, then more talking before Micky agreed that that was a good way to start a relationship. To start trying to start one, anyhow. And if it came to nothing, which it might, he’d at least have spent time with a groovy chick.

“So what are you going to do?” Micky clutched the paper box in a way sure to mangle the slice of pie before it reached the Duke Box.

“I think I’ll hang out here a while longer.”

“Checking out the competition?” Micky gestured at the stage and left, grinning.

 _Kind of?_ He felt stupid, but the unease settling in his stomach condensed into a heavier ball as he looked again at the _Lower Manhattan Casebook_ books. “Ma’am?” Mike smiled at the waitress he’d tipped nicely and held up the handful of hardbacks and paperbacks from the side table. “Would it be okay if I borrowed these? I’ll bring them back.”

“We’re…not really a public library?” She held her empty tray flat to her hip.

“Trade ya?”

“Huh?” She frowned.

Mike indicated the stage and the perspiring country boys playing. “I’m a better guitarist and singer than that trio—”

She sniffed. “Wouldn’t be hard.”

“How about I play a song? If it goes down well, I get a loan of these.”

Startled, the server caught the eye of the ‘singer’ on the podium and signaled something. Within a minute, he’d announced they were taking a break, and Mike was up there, feeling his way around the steel guitar and its steel tone bar and sitting to play it in his lap. Feeling even more stupid, he introduced himself, reliving the past and playing shopping malls and restaurants in his native state, then launched into the twangiest, most poetic version of _The Kind of Girl I Could Love_ he could manage. His three bandmates would have laughed themselves stupid to hear it, but it did the trick.

Ten minutes later, the manager’s plea to set up a regular spot following him down the street, Mike was heading for the bus stop, his hands full of books whose covers bore the picture of the dark-haired man with long sideburns, Stetson ever-present, sheepskin coat optional.

The first thing Mike learned, from the handy map in the frontispiece of the first book, was that the PI lived in the Lower East Side, which lay between the Bowery and the East River, and Canal Street and Houston Street. _Huh._ Houston, where Kincaid, the former Texas Ranger hero was from. Oh, and that is was bordered to the south and west by Chinatown, perhaps the source of the cryptic fortune cookie quotes that headed each chapter. _Land is always on the mind of the flying bird_ began chapter one of book one. Funny; Peter had that slip of paper stuck on the wall.

By the time the bus pulled into his stop along Beechwood, Mike thought he’d learned all he needed to, and he shook with emotion. Seeing Peter’s picture on the back of each had him almost crumpling the covers in a trembling fist. _It’s an old photo_ , Peter had said, not showing any surprise, or shock on hearing about the books. But perhaps he didn’t have any to show.

“Mike?” Peter found him sitting at the table, books strewn around him, when he came home later. About to bend low, probably to kiss Mike, he stopped.

“Wade catch his flight okay?”

“What— Oh. Yeah. What are you doing?” Peter picked up a book, then another. “These are Elizabeth’s aren’t they? Where did you get them?”

“I got them for a song. No, really.” It would be funny, under other circumstances, what he’d done. His fingers still smarted from the steel strings. “Did you know that ‘A wise man is the one that makes you think he is dumb’?”

“Maybe…I think I read it somewhere.”

“Yeah, you did, shotgun.”

 "Mike, you’re acting weird. What’s going on?”

“I was thinking you could tell me. Let’s take a walk.” Without waiting to see if Peter followed, Mike strode out of the back door and across the sundeck, hearing footsteps behind him scrambling down the rocks. He didn’t want this conversation in the pad.

“Michael.”

Mike slowed.

“Whatever it is, talk about it.”

Mike stopped, and Peter almost bashed into him. “Okay. Let’s talk about Elizabeth’s New York PI.”

“Ok…ay.” Peter blinked a little at the angle of the sun.

“Oh, we can’t, because he’s not actually a _New Yorker_ , see. He’s a former Texas Ranger, name of Kincaid. You know the fellah. Over six-foot tall, long sideburns, jet-black hair that grows in crazy waves? Slim, some say skinny? Oh, and he wears fringed boots and a sheepskin coat? And he’s never seen without his hat, in his case, his Stetson?”

“Mike?” Peter put a hand on Mike’s arm.

Mike shook it off. “He cooks—usually has a few down-home recipes with a twist in each book. Like quick tacos, left-over stew, lime butter chicken…” Mike named family recipes. “And he comes out with cornball sayings.”

“So do millions of people do both those things, surely?” Peter spoke slowly.

“Sayings he heard wrong originally, and made his own. Like, lower than a snake with bellyache, instead of lower than a snake’s belly. Did you know about any of this?”

“What are you saying?”

Peter answering a question with another question wasn’t lost on Mike. “Yeah, ol’ Kincaid’s originally from Houston. He sings and plays the twelve-string guitar. Writes his own songs.” Mike reeled off a couple of titles, and Peter’s eyes widened.

“They’re very similar—”

“To mine, yeah.” That hurt the most.

Peter turned to look out over the ocean. “So you’re saying you think this guy is based on you.”

“This hick in the big city, whose drawling twang and clothes make him stand out among the locals? Well, not to sound all broth and no beans here, but, yeah, I do. And if you think there’s a light or two burned out on my string, maybe the answer might lie with Hart, unofficial assistant to the wound-tight Kincaid.”

“Hart?” Peter looked wary.

“Yeah, the laid-back folk singer who plays the guitar in Greenwich Village cafes and clubs? Whose easy-going hippie approach grounds the uptight Kincaid, and who has a mop of blond hair and who wears loafers with, can you guess—”

“Fuck. Mismatched socks?”

“Ding ding! How could she know all this unless you told her, _Peter_? Told her everything, details about me, about you, about _us_? Did you think it was funny, what, co-writing these books with her? Using me? Using _us_?” The last bit was shouted the loudest.

“Michael.” Peter stepped right up to him, toe to toe, and curled his hands around Mike’s elbows. “I knew nothing about this until she told us both today. Look at me. You know I don’t lie, so believe me.”

“I want to,” Mike whispered, staring into those toffee-colored eyes he loved. “But…”

“What.”

“Means she’s a witch, then.”

“ _What?_ ” Confused, Peter dropped his hands.

“With one fuck of a crystal ball. Or how else to explain it, Peter? _"_


	8. Chapter Eight

“Before this goes any further, I need you to trust me.” Peter held eye contact and curled a slow hand around Mike’s nape, giving Mike time to duck away if he wanted. Mike didn’t, but he didn’t lean into the warmth wrapped around him, either.

“Pete—”

“Trust me? Trust?” Peter remained where he was, unflinching, solid yet turned to gold by the evening sun, until Mike gave a small nod.

“I…want to.” He released as much of his hurt and suspicion as he could in one long exhalation, copying Peter’s yoga breathing.

“Tell me how you’re feeling.” Peter brought up his free hand to Mike’s cheek.

“I’m _scared_.” He hadn’t known he was going to admit it until the words tumbled free.

“Because…”

“Because this— _us_ —is so good—no; _perfect_. And I’m scared it’s gonna go away or get taken away and…” He shook his head.

“You feel you want to break it, so you’re the one who broke it before it gets broken.”

It was like a punch to the gut, for all Peter had a thumb rubbing a small circle into Mike’s nape and was feathering his fingers along Mike’s face.

“That…that’s very long for a fortune cookie saying. I don’t remember that one.” He couldn’t joke this off. Peter wouldn’t allow it. “I trust you.”

“Trust _us_ ,” Peter whispered, closer now and rubbing the tip of his nose against Mike’s. “It is perfect, and I’m scared too. It’s still quite fragile, what we’re building. Nowhere _near_ complete yet. It’s a slow build.”

“What’s it made of?”

Peter pulled him down to sit, Peter in a quarter lotus and Mike cross-legged. “A lot of things. Music and fascination, the foundation. Then caring. And layers of affection and hopes and dreams. And more music. Always. And love, of course. Always.” He held out a hand as if to show how high the construction was now. Mike understood.

Peter dug into the sand at the side of him and lifted his hand, watching the grains run through his fingers. He sighed. “I think I can explain. But let me do it in my own way, please? It’s difficult, because I’m not very proud of…well, myself.”

Mike took Peter’s hand.

“You asked me why I’d never talked about marrying Elizabeth.”

“You said you didn’t think of it as being married.”

“And you knew there was more. Elizabeth made me understand how women are denied what _we’re_ given for nothing. I flunked out of college. My parents shrugged, and sent me back again. And I goofed off, again, and did the same, again. And all they said was I should sort myself out, travel, a year off working, look at different colleges, get some therapy, whatever. And Zizi skipped grades at school to graduate early and aced the entrance exam to three universities and chose Columbia. She took freshman and sophomore classes together in her first year at Barnard. I felt…ashamed. That I’d thrown away what she was fighting for and… Humbled. I just couldn’t think of a way to explain it, or when.”

Mike thought he understood, could sort through the jumble. “You did good.”

Peter shivered and Mike pulled him to his feet to start back to the pad. “Elizabeth knows us,” he observed, turning over the things he’d set aside to ponder. “Not just you and your love of fortune cookies, for instance. She knew our names. She asked whose turn it was to cook. She even knew about the crappy hot water in the pad!”

“I told her.”

Mike stopped. “You said—”

“I write her letters. Always have. All about my life here in LA. My thoughts, my hopes, setbacks, triumphs… She set up a PO box here for me when I left the Village, for any papers or forms or whatever.” He pre-empted Mike’s question. “Seems I told her a lot about the four of us.”

“Mainly me, I think.” Mike preened.

Peter smiled, his dimple peeking out. “I suppose. And that I used the writing to understand and confess my feelings. But I can’t believe she used any of it maliciously or cynically.”

“No.” Mike considered what he’d read. “She must’ve thought it was cute. Or, I don’t know, interesting. Especially judging by the way Kincaid now lives with Hart in the Village.”

“ _Really?_ ”

“Oh, he’s hiding at Hart’s place above the coffee shop from the mob. The two had to learn to get along.” Mike laughed. “Hart’s a vegetarian and Kincaid loves his steak and ribs. It’s quite funny. He says ‘Far out,’ and, ‘Outta sight,’ and Kincaid says, “I gotta mosey.”

Peter had to hang on to Mike because he was bent over laughing. They both waved at Davy, in the shallows in the distance, who was pretending not to see the girls who were pretending not to ogle him.

“Elizabeth said _finally_ we were together.” Mike rubbed his hands down Peter’s upper arms.

“I never told her I loved you!” Peter protested. “And I certainly didn’t tell her you loved me—how could I? It must have just been apparent from what I wrote.”

Mike thought again of the relationship in the books. Books written two years ago. “So she knew before we did. Women’s intuition. Huh.” He looked from Peter’s elongated shadow to Peter himself, outlined in fading light. Peter still wore the semi-formal clothes he’d put on earlier, his shirt open at the neck, no tie. He brushed his bangs from his eyes, eyes that gleamed with wicked intent as they looked at Mike.

“How do you feel now?” he asked, his deep baritone firing Mike’s nerve endings, making them sizzle, just as it made heat pool in his groin. Desire, strong and heavy, burned in him from the soul out.

“Like…you’d better start running.”

“ _What?_ Why does that sound like you have a gun cocked and—”

“Oh, it’s not a gun. I’m just pleased to see you.” Mike smirked. He bent his head to whisper right in Peter’s ear, “You, me, bedroom. Right now. Start running or I won’t be responsible for my actions.”

“That sounds…” Peter’s backtalk fizzled to nothing at the heat in Mike’s eyes and the hard lines of his body.

“You got yourself a head start there, so I suggest you take advantage of it. Go!” Mike slapped Peter’s ass to get him moving, then watched him scramble up the rocks and onto the sundeck, to vanish into the pad. Mike waited as long as he could, then raced after him.

“Marco?” he called, inside the main room.

“Polo!” came from upstairs. Their room. _Of course._ But when Mike burst into their room, he didn’t see Peter. Thinking he must be in the tiny bathroom, Mike started for there, only to whip around as the door slammed closed behind him. Before he could process that Peter had been hiding behind it, Peter was on him, thudding him onto the bed. Mike took a millisecond to feel smug at his bed-joining skills before he got a leg over Peter’s hip and pinned him flat, under Mike.

“Gotcha,” he whispered, undoing Peter’s shirt buttons to burrow into his neck, and inhaling the faintest scent of cologne. _His_ cologne, subtly different on Peter’s skin, and just the barest hint of it, their shared secret. It made Mike harder, if that was possible. He nuzzled deeper, until the strong pulse in Peter’s jugular began to speed, then bit down as he finished undoing Peter’s shirt and slid it off, going lower for Peter’s off-center belt buckle.

“Now, I didn’t see you get dressed this morning, and I haven’t touched you all day,” he said in between nips and kisses, watching Peter’s stomach muscles quiver with Mike’s descent. “But I’d bet anything you went commando.”

“Oh, you _slut_ ,” he moaned a second later, discovering he’d been right, easing Peter’s pants off for his dick to spring free, ready for Mike. “Just like on stage. Gettin’ me goin’ the way you do.” Gripping Peter’s hips to keep him still, Mike nuzzled into Peter’s dark-blond pubic hair.

“You weren’t complaining Friday,” came in a gasp.

True—they’d had to rush into the Twist dressing room, both made horny as hell by watching the other on stage. “I’m not complaining now,” Mike pointed out. He sat back to admire Peter lying naked, erect, stretched out and ready for him, eyes darkening with lust, a soft flush already starting on his chest and neck. _One thing missing._ Mike reached for the string of beads he’d gotten for Peter and lifted Peter’s head to loop them on him. _Beautiful._ Had he said that out loud?

“Like what you see?” One bent arm behind his head, Peter smoothed a hand down to work his cock, swiping his thumb over the head.

“I like it fine. In fact, any better and I’d think it was a setup. Do you have any idea what you do to me?” Mike fought to keep his tone conversational, to prevent his words from coming out in a fractured gasp. “Wait. Let me check…” He lifted Peter’s leg to raise his butt and assess the bite-mark bruise on one cheek. It had faded enough—Mike made sure he rationed himself.  

Peter’s breath stuttered, just a beat, but Mike caught it, and he could hardly miss the way Peter’s hand fell from his cock to grab at the sheet under him. “Got the next one plan—ahhh!” Peter’s question finished on a moan at Mike’s new bite.

Mike raised his head from Peter’s inner thigh. “Sure have, babe. And the one after that.” They would be nowhere that was visible to anyone else, not even with Peter in his swim shorts. They were just for them. “One day I’ll make you come just from that.”

“You nearly did,” Peter breathed.

Desire made Mike’s head swim and his cock harden further in his much-too-tight pants. The place being empty, they hadn’t put a record on to cover any noise, and the only sound was their breathing. He crawled up Peter to kiss him, deepening it until Peter groaned. He moaned louder when Mike bit his way down again, sliding his hands around to squeeze Peter’s ass cheeks. He gave Peter no time to process that before licking the head of his straining cock. “Watch,” he ordered, keeping his eyes on Peter’s face to see every nuance of his reaction to Mike opening his mouth and taking Peter in.

He slipped his hands forward to hold Peter down by his hips when Mike sucked hard. Peter was such a responsive partner, his ragged intakes of breath and broken exhalations accompanying Mike’s rhythm, and the haze of arousal thickening moment by moment. Peter’s eyes opened wide when Mike released Peter’s cock to rub two fingers over the head, coating them before easing them under Peter.

“S-sneaky!” Peter gasped when Mike slid his lubed fingers inside Peter at the same time he swallowed Peter’s cock to the root. The suddenness and Peter’s size made Mike’s throat give a slight spasming, which had Peter writhing as it worked the head of his cock while Mike’s mouth and tongue stimulated the shaft. But Mike pressing his fingers deep had Peter hissing.

Mike stopped, reading Peter’s responses. “You’re sore, from earlier? Why didn’t you say?” He tried to look sorry, not to feel smug. “I tried to be gentle. You got me revved.” They’d playacted a little and Peter’s reaction to dirty talk always fired Mike hotter.

“I’m fine.”

“That you are,” Mike agreed, using both hands to stroke him, to catch him by surprise and take him deep in his mouth again, having to swallow a mouthful of the pre-cum his action released. He reveled in the sting of Peter’s hands twisting in his hair in reaction. Now he had to use his hands and forearms to hold Peter’s bucking hips still. Peter’s body going rigid so quickly caught Mike out, although Peter tightening his fingers in Mike’s hair until it hurt should have told him. Mike pulled off in time to help Peter along with his hand—he loved watching him come, seeing his body arch and shudders rack it, and feeling his cock pulse in Mike’s fist.

“ _God._ ” Peter’s sigh was long and he loosened his grip on Mike’s hair.

“Oh.” Mike pouted. “I was gonna bring you to the edge at least twice before you fucked me.” He loved that, making Peter so desperate he powered into Mike, hammering home.

“Gimme a minute,” Peter replied, his chest still sucking in air.

“You look so good,” Mike breathed. Better than any picture Mike could have imagined. “So hot. Guess I’ll just sit here and wait.” He sat against the headboard next to Peter who laughed, shakily, and twisted to sit and try to undress Mike.

“That’s enough.” Mike stopped him when Peter had undone his belt buckle and pants and loosened the latter. He couldn't wait any longer.

“Yes.” Peter eyed him. Or specifically one part of him. “Close your eyes.”

“Wh—” Mike decided against arguing, letting Peter take the reins and— _oh, Jesus!_ —show Mike he wasn’t the only one who could use cum as lube. Peter, astride him, clenched around him, pushing back into Mike’s thrusts, and still trying to undress Mike fully as he did so…

Much later, aching in fulfilment, boneless with satiation, trying to throw what clothes remained on the bed onto the floor, Mike dislodged a sheaf of papers from Peter’s bedside table. He twisted to get them—brochure, leaflets, a typed itinerary…

“Peter, you seen these?”

“Mmm?”

“I guess they’re from Elizabeth, about the award ceremony? I thought it would be a matter of going up on stage one evening, accepting some certificate…”

“But…?” Peter tried to roll over and see.

“But it’s not. It’s a huge event, a gathering of detective fiction writers, publishers, editors, agents, booksellers and readers, talks, interacting, discussions _for a whole weekend_.”

“A _weekend_? How the hell am I going to manage that?”

“You’re not.” Mike didn’t like this at all. The heavy feeling was back. “You’re not,” he repeated, turning to face him. “ _We_ are.”


	9. Chapter Nine

“What are you more nervous about, _George_ , your accent slipping or that Pete’s taken your bike?” Davy stepped back from his work and assessed Mike as he asked the question.

“ _George._ ” Mike shook his head. “George Jones. From St. John’s Wood, London. Just whose dumb idea was this?”

“ _Daft_ ,” corrected Davy. “No dumb, _daft_. With, like, three _R_ sounds in the middle. Try it?”

“ _Darrrft_.” Mike nodded. They’d all been surprised, him mainly, that he’d learned to mimic Davy’s accent over the course of the week.

“Well, you didn’t want anyone to recognise you.” Davy combed a little more gel through Mike’s hair to slick it back. “I’m just impressed that you grew those sideburns the size of Texas in a week. And it’s almost a pity we had gigs set up for this week so you didn’t want to grow a beard and mustache. I think you’d look great beardy.” He looked as surprised as Micky and Mike did at that comment and said hurriedly, “ _M’starsh_. Go on?”

Mike repeated it obediently, rolling his shoulders to settle the pinstriped suit.

“Hey, Mike?” Micky called from the table that looked like a library.

“Uh-huh?” Mike cussed, hip to his mistake right away, not needing the balled-up sheet of paper Micky threw to clue him in. “What?”

“Pop quiz. In which book is the dramatic jump of the New York-Presbyterian Lower Manhattan Hospital surgeon from the Brooklyn Bridge?”

“ _Square One_ ,” Mike answered with confidence. The bridge featured heavily in the background of the cover, so…

“And in which is the Chief Executive Officer of the New York Stock Exchange’s twin brother’s corpse found on the Staten Island ferry?"

“ _Think Twice_.” Again, the ferry stood out on the cover…

“And in which is the chief of police of the fifth precinct poisoned with LSD during mass at St. Patrick’s Cathedral?”

“ _Cloud Nine_?” He was going by the subject matter…

“ _High Five._ The clue was in the title.” Micky, their book coach, frowned. “Hey, I’m starting to see a theme with these titles.”

“ _Starting_ to?” Davy mocked. “There’s what, _Fifth Column_ , _Third Degree_? I was hoping for a _Ménage à Trois_ , meself.”

“Yeah, I just bet you were.” Mike took a final look at himself. With the longer sideburns, the slicked-back hair, the eyeglasses, he looked…a fool. And a fool in disguise at that. He clapped the smart hat on. “Well, come on. One of you has to drive me so you can bring back the car to transport the equipment to the club later.”

“If Davy drives, I can quiz you some more,” Micky offered. “I don’t think you understood how Kincaid knew there was a bomb planted in the Federal Hall in _Twenty-Four Seven_.”

Mike didn’t think so either: he hadn’t read the damn book. He wished not for the first time that Micky was doing this instead of him, but he didn’t trust anyone other than him to watch out for Peter. Or rather, _Wade_. “I’m still not sure what a literary agent does,” he mused, as they drove out of Santa Monica and up into Beverly Hills.

“Oh, just like any other sort of agent: takes fifty percent,” Micky answered.

“And you’re sure you’ll make the gig tonight?” Davy questioned, slowing the car to a halt on Wilshire Boulevard.

Mike started to reassure him, but his jaw dropped open at the sight of the opulent hotel. “ _This_ is the place?” he questioned. “It’s like something outta Vegas!”

“I think you mean it’s as large as Buck House. Buckingham Palace to you philistines.” Davy sighed. “Why did I even bother? You still call jam jelly and laugh when I make a mistake writing something and ask who’s got a rubber I can borrow. Just get to the club on time, all right?”

Mike nodded his promise, Micky’s wisecracks about a rubber _preventing_ a mistake floating by him. And, once ushered through the arched entrance into the luxury hotel by the uniformed doorman, Mike tried not to gawp like a bumpkin at the marble lobby, but his breath caught at the most gorgeous thing in there. _Peter._

Peter’s way-overdue-for-a-trim hair was combed into a centre-parted style, curving around his face, the dark-blond a sweet contrast to the darker beard. _Peter with a beard. Lord have mercy._ And not to forget the _m’starsh_. Mike would forever hear the word in Davy’s voice from now on. Peter wore dark glasses, a collarless shirt, flared pants and dusty suede ankle boots. He looked… Mike became aware Peter was calling him.

“You made it.”

“Yes?” was all Mike could manage. He let Peter lead him to the reception desk. “Is she okay?”

“Who?”

“ _My bike!_ ” Mike hissed.

“Yes,” Peter sighed and hefted his small bag over one shoulder. “Tucked up safely below us in the car park.”

They’d need the bike to get to Sunset for the gig. Mike checked in, thankful that Elizabeth’s publisher or agent or personal assistant, for all he knew, had made all the arrangements. He confirmed with the receptionist that the hotel would not be revealing Wade Thompson was there attending the conference, that he was guaranteed absolute privacy.

“I say, this gaff is awfully grand,” he observed, his voice strangled and prim, thinning his lips when Peter fought a heroic battle not to double over, laughing.

“Yeah. It’s boss, man. Real trippy.”

Okay, so Peter as _Wade_ was just as stupid. “Where’s the convention taking place?” Mike asked in his own voice as they made for the elevator. No one milling about was paying attention to them, not the group of men, as tie-free as Peter and stoop-shouldered from desk work, emerging from a side corridor and arguing the merits of big-city over small-town settings in detective fiction. Nor the group of thin, bejewelled high-society ladies glaring at them and trip-trapping in their high heels on the marble floor, their purses or their little dogs tucked under their arms.

“Oh, we’re kind of removed from the hotel proper.” Peter confirmed Mike’s assumptions. “In that section back there. That’s where the Orchid Room and the Rose Room, the one with a stage, are.” Peter pointed. “And _we_ have adjoining rooms,” he said as the glass and gold elevator ascended to their floor.

Mike had argued against them actually staying in the hotel, claiming they could easily arrive for whatever events were scheduled and leave later in the day, but now he was here…

“Come on in,” Peter invited him, opening his door, slipping off his dark glasses and slinging his duffel bag inside.

“Nice.”

“Have you even looked at the room? You’re just staring at the bed,” Peter claimed.

“Not true, shotgun. I’m looking at you too. Because, Peter, I gotta say, you with a beard? It’s…”

“I know. You ‘told’ me earlier, when I stuck it on.” The light still gleamed in Peter’s eyes. “Should I really grow one? You seem to like it.”

“ _No._ ” Mike’s answer came swift. Peter strutting around LA as sexy as _that_ , for just _anyone_ to see? _Nuh-uh._ Mike’s mama didn’t raise no fool who was slower than stalled molasses. “You’re sweeter than baby's breath,” he told Peter.

“And _you’ve_ overdosed on Kincaid. Yesterday you said someone was three gallons of plum crazy in a two-gallon apple bucket.”

“Well, he is. Come here.” Mike couldn’t stand it any longer. His lips still tickled and his fingertips still stung from kissing and caressing bearded Peter earlier and he itched, no; _ached_ to feel Peter again. “And besides, it’s bad luck to be in a hotel room and not test the bed. Everyone knows that.”

“It does look bigger than ours.” Peter tested the bed by diving onto it. He lay in the middle and stretched out his arms, moving them as if he were making a sand angel. “Umm, feels bigger too.”

“And before you make a terrible joke about it not being the only thing to feel bigger…” Mike dived on top of him, catching him by the shoulders and pinning him down, not that Peter was resisting. He pressed his tongue hard against Peter’s mouth and Peter opened for Mike to taste him. Herbal tea, mint toothpaste—Peter tantalized Mike’s senses. He always had done, but now they were a couple and he was allowed to taste Peter's essence for himself, it made Mike weak. He sucked at Peter’s tongue, drawing him into his mouth for a kiss both sensuous and hungry, then swept his tongue into Peter’s mouth, leaving no inch untouched.

“Wow.”  Peter blinked a little dazedly when Mike finally let him up for air. “That was… Is it being in a hotel room? The beard? What’s turning you on so much?”

“It’s you.” Mike’s answer was firm. “Well, the beard’s not hurting… Come on.” He pulled himself free of the tempting bed and the much more tempting Peter on it. “We’re supposed to be at some sort of round table or panel or something.”

They paused for Mike to throw his small bag into his room next door and took the elevator down again. He shucked his jacket, the shirt and vest making him warm enough, and rolled up the shirt sleeves to the elbows, slowly and carefully, just to make Peter’s eyes darken with lust. Peter loved Mike’s fur, as he called it, and sure enough, he brushed against Mike to run his fingers down the dark hair revealed on his forearms.

“Not in the ‘lift’,” cautioned Mike-as-Davy. “Or the lobby, which is on the ground floor, because it’s level with the ground. The first floor is the floor above it.”

Peter eyed him. “I don’t think anyone will be quizzing you about the hotel layout.”

“I guess not. I mean, one supposes not.” Mike checked his glasses were on straight, feeling foolish. “Thanks awfully,” he said to the assistant who handed them their badges outside the Rose Room, making Peter turn away to hide a grin and slot his dark glasses on again.

The pretty room was only half-full, which surprised Mike, until he recalled that today was industry only, the ticket-buying public part of the event beginning tomorrow. Tables and chairs languished in the back half of the room, with rows of chairs set to face the stage at the front of the salon, where the main action seemed to be.

Mike recognized the logos of a couple of local radio stations, with people recording the discussion. What he took to be reporters, perhaps from local papers, sat on the edge of the stage too. He was thankful again that the convention people had been informed of Wade’s almost pathological need for privacy and discretion. _Maybe we can get through this._

Mike took a subtle peep at the program to see who exactly was on stage and talking about what. He recognized one of the names—the writer had been popular for years, ever since Mike had been a kid, and the other guys were about the same age as that one or slightly younger. The first couple of rows were filled with older guys too, younger ones back in the farther rows, where he and Peter sat.

“Look at the old guard,” Peter commented, about the stage, making people near them look around, then look again, and nudge one another and whisper. Mike…didn’t like it. There seemed some running gag up on the platform too, with an empty seat in the midst of the six or so writers, and J.D. Stevens, the wrinkled, gray, teacherly type guy leading the discussion, made reference to it.

“Oh, it would be good to know his opinion on that too!” he exclaimed, his voice swooping, theatrical, as he made an exaggerated turn to the vacant chair. “Mr. Thompson, do… Ah, yes. Of course. Elusive as ever…” The panel tittered.

Peter stood, then stood on his chair. He raised a hand.

“Yes?” snapped Stevens.

“The limelight, the spotlight…it’s not my bag, dude. But if you have something that’s bugging you, lay it on me. I’d be happy to have a rap session. Oh, let me introduce myself. Wade Thompson.”

Mike rolled his eyes and Peter stepped from his chair. He was tall enough not to need it to be seen.

“Who…you’re…he’s…” The discussion leader seemed to have stuck, and it took a huddled confab with his fellow panellists, during which the reporters turned to Peter, to unstick him.

“Mr. Thompson—”

“Wade’s groovy, man.”

“ _Wade._ ”

Mike distrusted the yellow-toothed smile the old guy flashed their way. He was almost rubbing his hands together. The reporters licked the ends of their pencils and the radio journalists jostled to get closer to the panel. _So much for low-profile, near-invisibility, head down, get award and peel out._ He should have known it was never going to be that simple, he realized, as the muttering around them intensified.

 


	10. Chapter Ten

“But to return to the subject we were discussing, that of the parvenus, the Johnny Come Latelys, this new crop of detective writers springing up like mushrooms,” continued Stevens, a gleam in his eye, directing his words at the audience.

“It seems there’s a detective in each New York borough nowadays!” joked another old guy to Stevens’ right. Correlating the name plate in front of him on the table with the program told Mike he was a publisher. Mike wondered how many of the authors sharing the platform with him worked for him.

“And wow, don’t you find they all have their gimmicks, these days?” asked another guy on stage. He looked out into the room and tapped his thick cigar into the ashtray.

A gray-haired black guy in the row in front of Mike and Peter nudged the man next to him. “Here we go,” he muttered.

Mike missed a comment made from the panel, but caught the, “Black _noir_!” someone else on the platform threw in.

“And what these so-called books have in common is they’re all written to a formula to feed an indiscriminate audience—potboilers churned out to make money rather than being pieces of art carefully crafted for the love of the puzzle.” Stevens took a half-bow to his panel.

Mike stood, in solidarity with Peter. “For a writer, that was some mixed metaphor there, buddy.” His accent had slipped to more than mid-Atlantic now. “Old boy,” he added, trying to lasso it back.

Stevens glared, then turned to his fellow panellists, ignoring the room. “But oh, the classics, constructed as cerebral delights, intellectual thrills—”

“Give me an example?” Peter folded his arms.

“Readily! The master, Sherlock Holmes!” Stevens spat, standing in his turn.

“Oh, come on! Talk about gimmicks! And commercial…Doyle pumped out a story a month, some of them weak and repetitive, you dig? And commercial pressure made him bring back Holmes. Twenty thousand people cancelled their subscription to _The Strand_ magazine when he killed off the hero he’d come to despise in December 1893, and Doyle was forced to first write an early career story then resurrect Holmes to ‘appease an audience’.”

“Peter…?” whispered an astonished Mike

“Sherlock Holmes fan from way back. But a discriminating one,” Peter muttered.

“Pshaw! Anyone can take anything out of context and—”

“And the books you write?” Mike interrupted Stevens but included all the fossilized panel in his reply. “That gumshoe flatfoot stuff? _Still?_ It was current in the _forties_ , man! It’s not moved with the times at all. The way it treats women or coloreds or Chinese or Hispanics is just _awful_.”

Mike had grown up in a black neighborhood, with a smart, focused mother, one who had her own dreams that she pursued at the same time as providing for her family. He knew about real life, real people, real struggles, not lazy, harmful stereotypes.

The murmurs around them grew louder, became _hear, hear_ noises.

“Sir, who are you? I know you’re not Mr. Thompson’s, sorry, _Wade_ ’s literary agent.” Stevens sounded triumphant, as though he’d caught Mike out.

“Oh, he must be a Hollywood agent!” called a panel member. “God knows there’re enough of them here—let’s ask them to stand and take a bow?”

No one stood, but it was obvious from the looks and chatter which nicely dressed audience members, sitting in the middle, were being referenced.

“ _Hollywood agents?_ ” queried a radio reporter.

“Oh, reading is becoming a lost art, don’t you know?” Stevens sawed in a savage breath, powering up. “Other media are killing it. Not just the big screen—the TV networks have executives here, looking for popular stories and authors, to approach them. They’re desperate for modern detective series, to ride the trend and fill up the viewing hours.”

“They’re footing the bill for this convention, right?” queried a journalist at the front of the stage.

“Must be why it’s at such a rich-swank hotel,” Mike reasoned, and those seated near enough to him to hear laughed.

“Yes, it’s why detective fiction is coarsening!” cried another old guy on the platform. “These so-called writers are producing what I believe are called telegenic works now.”

“Pure prostitution,” harrumphed Stevens.

“Is it true there’s a bidding war to buy the rights to Thompson’s books?” a radio journalist asked the panel, perhaps just to rile them up more. It made for something more interesting to report, Mike supposed.

 _Is it true?_ Mike asked Peter via a frown.

 _No idea,_ replied Peter’s shrug, and Mike pulled Peter to sit as most of the audience turned to them.

“Good for you, man,” said the black guy from the row in front.

“Five on five, brother?” replied Peter, holding out his hand to shake his new friend’s.

“Love how you made him eat dirt!” chipped in the man next to him.

“It wasn’t that brutal, as criticism goes,” Peter demured. “I had much worse at college. And from you at rehearsals,” he added in a quieter tone to Mike. “But there’s room for everyone. No need to shut people out.”

“Right on!” someone called across.

Mike tried to sink into his seat. The session broke up soon after that, and they slipped out of the room's side door as soon as they could, avoiding as many people as possible. “I think we should call Elizabeth.” He spoke over Peter, when he went to protest. “I’m a little miffed she’s held back so much about this situation.”

This had been a topic of conversation all week, Mike not happy they’d been led to believe the event was a lot smaller and low key than it actually was. “And now all this stuff! Other writers envious of Wade, or whatever, and talk about agents sniffing around to buy books for TV and film?” Things could turn ugly. “She should be dealing with this. How do we know what to say?”

“I’m sure she didn’t know,” Peter the peacemaker insisted. Nevertheless, Mike stood over when they found a phone and Peter put through a call to New York, to leave a message for Elizabeth.

“Are you coming to the dinner?” asked one of their new friends, passing them.

“We have to split.” Peter clapped him on the shoulder. “Going to a gig on the Strip.”

“Wish we weren’t,” Mike admitted, once they were out of the elevator to the parking garage. “Oh, I know we need the money and playing in clubs is what we want, but the Twist?”

The liquor-free venues for the younger teens weren’t the same as the licensed premises, in his opinion, and the performance hours were earlier and shorter for the younger crowd. It hardly seemed worth setting up for. But they’d negotiated a good rate, and had all agreed on it in a meeting, and hoped it would lead to bigger and better things. Music producers and PR people scouted all the Strip venues.

“Lay a patch,” Peter said, nodding at the bike.

“Huh?”

“Burn rubber. Move!”

“Couldya stop with the hippie jive while I’m trying to get down the Strip? I gotta concentrate.” Did it mean he was getting old, if he thought the twelve-blocks area got busier and noisier with pedestrians and cars and cops every weekend?

“Free man. Not hippie. Jeez. Keep up,” was murmured from behind him as they headed off, dodging cruising and drag-racing cars and meandering and scurrying teenagers as they went.

* * * *

“Mike, you know how the owner of the Twist doesn’t like hippies?” Peter spoke to Mike’s reflection in the mirror as they prepped in the Twist’s changing room in an almighty hurry for their performance.

“Yeah.” Mike munched on an apple and tried to make his hair look more like it usually did. He pushed the carton of lukewarm soup over to Peter. _Huh. The hotel must’ve laid on a feast of a dinner and here we are—_

“Well, do you think he’ll object to this beard? Because it’s stuck.”

“I know it’s stuck. How else would it stay… _Oh_.” Yeah, how did fake beards come off? Mike cast a wild eye around the dressing table and saw nothing helpfully labeled as fake facial hair remover. “Ah. Well, let’s hope that even if Costelli doesn’t like hippies, he likes free men?”

He didn’t. He wasn’t happy about that or telling Mike he had a phone call in the office, when their set finished.

“Tell us about the conference!” wailed Micky.

“ _Shh!_ ” Mike heard Peter advising Micky behind him as he sped off. A phone call? It couldn’t be Elizabeth, trying to catch them? _No._ “Lola? _Hi!_ ” he exclaimed. “Nice to hear— Oh, did you want Micky?”

“Not…really.”

He could hardly hear her. The office at the Duke Box was far away from the dancefloor and had better soundproofing than the tiny cubby here. She was lucky.

“I, we, need a favor.”

“A lot of that going around too,” Mike sighed, but when he heard, he was glad to agree and pursuade the others.

“I told you!” Micky crowed.

“Huh?” Davy spared a second from cramming his tambourines into his instrument bag to glare at him. “When did you tell us one of the Jacks Brothers’ legendary fights would mean they can’t perform at the Duke Box tonight?”

“Not that!” Micky smiled his thanks at Peter for helping unscrew the cymbals. “I said we’d soon be rushing from performing an early set to a later one somewhere else.”

“You did.” Peter tossed Micky’s drumsticks into the bag Davy held out. “But predicting Phil would punch Bill or Bill would thump Phil wasn’t a hard call. Not from what we’ve seen this week.”

“I’m surprised they got this far into their residency,” Mike agreed. “Their rows are like cabaret, right? I guess it all kicked off in the dressing room earlier.”

He held the door for the others, trying to remember who was the first act at the Box on a Friday. The Duke Box booked leading acts for residencies, usually a week or two, and had local bands playing regular support spots first. Seemed the club prefered the Monkees, rather than ask tonight's support to perform an extra set. Could they use this to get a coveted Friday or Saturday spot? In addition to or instead of one of their week nights?

As crazy as this pace was, Mike was glad of it to take his mind of the rest of the weekend. “Don’t ask,” he replied when Micky nagged them again to describe the convention. “We gotta sort out a set list as we drive!”

Peter had taken the bike and was waiting for them outside the now-familiar club when they arrived as soon as they could. “I hope Paul Duke likes beards,” he said, trying again to pull his free, to no avail.

Whether the Duke Box owner did or didn’t, they never discovered, but Jo-Ann, the tall blonde waitress dropping them off on-the-house beers in the dressing room, did. Peter’s beard _and_ Mike’s longer sideburns. Mike had to admit to a shiver running down his spine when the woman stroked Peter’s mustache and beard, laughing when told they were fake, and Mike’s sideburns at the same time with gentle fingers.

“Ah. That’s why it went nowhere with her!” Micky said to Davy as they all dashed to the stage. “She likes guys who can grow facial hair! That lets you out.”

"Hey, it didn’t go nowhere," Mike said, not liking the look on Davy's face once his glare after the fleeing Micky had gone. "You spent the night with the lovely Jo-Ann.”

“And her roommate, Leah. They put on a bit of a show for me and everything.” But Davy didn’t look too happy at the memory and his voice wasn’t a brag.

Mike glanced at him. “Bit…too exciting?” he asked, his volume low. “As in, just spectating the warm-up had you—”

“Ye…ah. You know how it is? You…know how it is.” Davy’s eyebrows were in his hairline.

“ _Mike?_ ” Peter queried, joining them. “I kind of heard that. Is your unexpected familiarity with threesomes the reason why we have the ‘no talking about our pasts’ rule? Maybe we should rethink that. Because I’m curious.” The last three words were whispered right in Mike’s ears in that dark baritone that revved Mike’s engines.

“And here I go again,” Mike muttered, turning to push against Peter to show him that once again, the deceptively angelic-looking man was responsible for Mike performing with a boner.

“Hey, Friday-night crowd. It should go down well.” Jo-Ann brushed between Mike and Peter, leaving them staring after her, both hard.

There was no time to puzzle out her ambiguous words. It was just them and their music, their sound and energy filling the club. After, checking the traffic situation out in the street, Mike found the usual din and chaos, cars on both sides of the street and kids milling about both on the sidewalk and in the middle of the road. He recognized one.

“Dean, hey, man,” he called. When the guy didn’t respond, Mike wondered if he’d committed a faux-pas. They knew each other from the look-out, so perhaps—

“Hey!” Dean pulled the small transistor radio away from his ear and waved, then came over.

“You still reading that?” Mike pointed at the book in Dean’s pocket. “It’s…oh.”

“His latest.” Dean pulled out a book of a series Mike now hated. “ _Ten a Penny_. ‘Outta sight!’ And you know what I just heard?” He waggled the radio. “The author’s at the Crime and Detective Writers of America convention right here in LA, man! It’s all over the airwaves—everyone will be going to try and meet him!”

 


	11. Chapter Eleven

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Mainly just PWP. Apologies in advance.

_I have to tell Peter about this new development_ , was Mike’s thought on waking. He should have told him last night, when he’d found out that Wade Thompson’s low profile had been raised, his presence at the convention broadcast, literally, via local radio and probably press. _But, Peter…motorbike…_ whined the non-excuse, inside his head.

Yeah, Mike should be ashamed that the sight of Peter on a borrowed motorbike had short-circuited his brain. And that it had been Jo-Ann’s Kawasaki street scrambler! She’d mentioned having a bike, but they’d never seen it, and it seemed she’d offered it to Peter when she knew they had to split double-quick. And when Peter had ridden up on it in the parking lot…

 _Focus_ , Mike ordered himself. Lack of focus was the reason he hadn’t mentioned the new development to Peter once they’d reached the hotel last night. Oh, and that had been after grinning like loons and racing up into the hills and back, overtaking the other and falling back as the other took the lead. Well, if lack of focus meant down and dirty sex… _Peter needs his own bike._ Actually, with the gigs they were getting nowadays and the money they were making, they should get a second car. And not one of those beach buggies Micky wanted, to ride out over the dunes trawling for chicks. He could damn well tinker with a VW Beetle and customize his own. But a little bitty third-hand jeep, perhaps…

 _Yeah, still not focusing._ He pressed into the warm body at his side. God, he loved sleeping with Peter. Sleeping meaning _sleeping_ , going to sleep with. He’d never thought he’d like sharing a bed every night with another person, him being all gangly and sprawl-limbed, but that warmth and comfort next to him, to spread over or have draped over him, or simply to lie against? _That intimacy?_ It blew his mind. He totally understood what Micky lacked. But—

The bed rocked, and Mike understood why when the _tunk_ of a glass being set down on the bedside table was followed by the bed dipping: Peter settling back into place. He stretched and Mike turned, nuzzling into Peter’s underarm hair. The gold color and silky texture fascinated him, especially now, with it a perfect contrast to Peter’s beard. He shuffled lower in the bed to pounce, only for his head to meet Peter’s, also lunging low for Mike. The knock made Mike see stars.

“Owww!”  Peter lay back.

“Awww.” Mike rolled on top of Peter. “I’ll kiss it better.” He returned to what he’d been attempting to do, before the collision stopped him.

“I didn’t bang _that_ head.”

But Peter’s tone wasn’t one of complaint as Mike licked his shaft from base to tip, putting extra pressure on the nerve-rich bundle below the head. Rolling himself between Peter’s parted legs, Mike reached the head of Peter’s stiffening cock, treating that to a series of short swirls with his tongue, getting it wet with his saliva. Within seconds, Mike was able to lap up the salty bead of liquid shining there, and pressing his tongue into the slit made Peter inhale in the way that told Mike he should take him in fully, slide his lips down Peter’s length. He still felt proud he could so easily—Peter was big.

He loved how quickly he got the silky-feeling skin loose enough to move easily over the hardness. Mike got a hand to Peter’s balls, stroking gently, tangling into the soft covering of hair. Peter’s hips bucked, just a little, and Mike backed off, just a little. Peter got his hand to his cock, giving it a lazy pull.

“You look…” Mike shook his head, words lost at the sight of Peter lying there, fingers toying with his erect dick. “Trying to tempt me to climb on and go for a ride? Oh, and good morning.”

“Trying to make me come, so you can fuck me? Good morning,” Peter batted right back.

Mike wouldn’t have expected anything else. “I could be just getting you harder for me there, babe.” He smirked.

“I doubt that. Because haven’t you noticed you prefer to fuck in the mornings and get fucked at nights?”

“Must be some Capricorn thing?” Mike tried to read Peter’s face, to listen to what wasn’t being said, the notes that weren’t being played. Did Peter think they’d fallen into a routine? Was he bored?

“What, all Capricorns prefer to pitch?”

“Dunno about that, but, yeah, I do. But I’ll bottom for you anytime. Whatever and whenever you want, babe.” He inched himself up Peter’s body and made sure Peter was looking him in the eye. “I love you fucking me. You know that. Never doubt it.” He laughed. “It’s like saying I prefer Champagne to different Champagne.”

“Hmm.” Peter pursed his lips in thought, searching Mike’s face. “And you want to fuck me now, right?”

“What gave me away?” Mike shifted, his erection throbbing. “I’d like to be inside you, yeah.” He eased Peter’s hand away and took over jacking him, slowly.

A wicked light came into Peter’s eyes. “So, if I let you take me now—”

“ _Let_ me? Be _begging_ me, more than like,” Mike scoffed.

“Then you’re mine, later,” Peter finished. “And I get to—”

“Yes.”

“ _Yes?_ ” Peter half-sat. “I didn’t even say—”

“ _I_ did. I said yes.” Mike brushed Peter’s bangs from his eyes and stroked his beard while he was there.

“To _anything_?” Peter whispered, right in Mike’s ear.

“Uh-huh,” Mike managed, through his shiver. He hoped that had put a stop to any notion Peter might have that Mike wasn’t happy about…anything. Because he was. So fucking happy about every second he got to spend with Peter. He didn’t care what they did as long as they were together. And if that happened to involve tapping Peter’s very fine ass, well, that was a bonus. The smile taking over Peter’s face was pure wickedness. “ _Anything_ ,” Mike whispered back, nibbling the tip of Peter’s ear in a move Peter had deemed as _unfair_.

“You strike a hard bargain.” Peter wriggled flat again. “And when I say h—”

“I got it,” Mike interrupted, showing Peter he knew just what was hard. “And now you’re gonna get it.”

“Yeah?” Peter imitated him.

“Oh yeah.” Mike stretched out an arm for the tube of slick under his pillow. A quick tussle and roll and Mike was mostly on his side with Peter mostly on his front, close to him. his face turned to Mike’s. The perfect position for him to kiss Mike, or Mike to kiss him…and prep him.

“Like the first time,” Peter murmured.

“Yeah.” Mike closed his eyes at the memory. “Well, you know I love to see your face, but I can’t resist that ass.” He slapped it where it lay, perfectly placed under his hand, in illustration, loving how Peter’s jolt of reaction turned into him nipping Mike’s neck. Peter’s beard scratched in just the right way.

“You like fucking my ass.”

“Just as much as you love getting that tight ass filled, yeah.” He could see what Peter was in the mood for. As he’d promised, he’d give Peter whatever he wanted. Whatever he needed. “But yeah. I fucking _love_ feeling you squirm when I take you, that initial resistance your body puts up. Then the way when you accept it? That’s even better. Even hotter.”

He relished Peter’s moan. “Oh, babe, that moment when your body stops fighting it and you stop biting your lip and embrace it? And in that second before you start to let go and start writhing on my cock, you look at me and smile – and it’s like the sun rising.”

He fell silent. Well he would—he’d just bared his soul. “Yeah, that smile,” he added, touching his fingertip to Peter’s dimple.

“Mike…” Peter looked dazed. “That’s beautiful.”

“Yeah, well. You make me poetical, shotgun. And not to ruin the mood, but it’s—”

“Not the only thing rising,” Peter said, before Mike could. He bent so there was no space between his mouth and Mike’s ear. “How do you want to fuck me?”

“Deep and long.” Mike’s reply came instantly.

“Hands and knees then.”

“Yeah. And real slow, if possible.”

Peter grinned. “I told you that’s only going to be possible if we can smoke up and have a long, slow make-out session.”

“I know. We’ll have to use the growing-up-poor-in-Texas method: give the kids some money to go to the Saturday matinee in town, get the place to ourselves for an afternoon.”

“Huh.” Peter considered. “Back home, we all got sent to Sunday school so our parents could have the house to themselves for an hour or so.”

“And that, right there, is the difference in how we were raised,” Mike observed. “But makes no odds—I can’t see us persuading Micky and Davy to go to church, let alone Bible classes.”

“So we’ll need plenty of cash for the movies and a big bag of grass.” Peter nodded.

“Can we stop talking?” Mike punctuated his request by thrusting against Peter and slapping his ass cheek. _Hard._ The crack echoed in the room. “Want me inside you? Then I gotta prep you.”

“You haven’t got to. You want to. You like it,” Peter asserted.

“And I like throwing you across my knee and spanking the sass outta you too.” Mike raised a warning finger. He’d see what Peter was jonesing for.

Peter’s answer for now was twist up onto his hands and knees, his athleticism making in one easy, seamless action, and press his chest into the sheet under him. Mike took his time, wanting Peter humming in anticipation, his skin heated and his brain buzzing with the wait. And because he liked to look at Peter, in this position, see those beach-honed muscles elongating and flexing. And yeah, watching Peter play at volleyball and beachball and racquets and all the variations of beach softball and rounders they invented was a treat. Sure enough, Peter peeped around, earning himself a swat, which Mike softened by kissing along Peter’s back and spine. When he touched his lubed fingers to Peter’s hole, Peter backed into them, trying to force the pace.

“Told you you’d be begging.” Mike eased in a finger, stretching, applying pressure.

Peter moaned. “ _More._ ”

“Getting there.” Mike pushed deep, then pulled out most of the way to check the gel. Within a second, he’d added a second finger, smiling into Peter’s lower back at the way Peter rocked onto him. He felt Peter’s arousal spike, saw Peter’s hand sneak around to his erection. “Getting close,” he whispered, slipping in a third finger.

“So fuck me!” came out in a groan.

“Want you closer.”

“I damn well am!” Peter widened the gap between his knees.

Mike leaned forward to rub his morning scruff over Peter’s nape. _Maybe I should grow a beard_ , came his thought as Peter squirmed deliciously. “You bought yourself a reprieve there,” he murmured and grasped Peter’s hips. He stroked his cock between the cheeks of that gorgeous ass in front of him, the ass that was all his, just for him. How to call the noise that dragged from Peter? A whine?  A whimper?

“Now you’re ready.” Mike lined up and, inch by inch, sank into Peter’s body. Like when he’d banged his forehead against Peter’s earlier, this had his vision tunneling, blackness at its edges. “You hold me so goddam tight,” he breathed. “I’ll try for slow, but…”

Their pace soon quickened, and he swatted Peter’s ass on every other push, making Peter writhe, just as Mike had described. “Feel full?” Mike said, trying not to gasp, and trying not to lose it at the long moan of agreement Peter gave in reply.

“Still can’t believe you’re mine,” Mike admitted, speeding his strokes, blinking at the sound of skin slapping skin that echoed in the room. He tried to interpret Peter’s movements. “Yeah, go ahead. Stroke yourself.” He loved seeing Peter come unraveled. It wouldn’t take long. Not with Mike changing to short hard thrusts and biting the back of Peter’s neck. Again he read Peter’s shudders and the broken words he gasped out. It was time to shift just so and nudge against—

Half-shouting, Peter fell forward as his climax hit, the extra tightness and grip on his cock triggering Mike’s. “ _Fuck,_ ” he panted, falling onto Peter. He’d wanted it to last. Long and slow and—

“Next time.” Peter understood. Of course he did.

Mike pulled free, all slow reluctance. He caught sight of the time on the clock and the day wrapped around his shoulders, with all its obligations, its demands, its difficulties. And, before he could settle down with Peter, the phone rang.

“Who…?” Peter frowned, picking up the receiver.

Mike reckoned he knew. He crowded close, so he could hear the receptionist, her tone apologetic.

“…cannot apologize enough.” Peter had found the loudspeaker button. “But a crowd’s gathered, still gathering, actually, demanding to speak to Wade Thompson. There’s so many. It’s getting out of hand. We’re not sure what to do…”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Would love any feedback, especially if you think there's too much (gratuitous) sex in this fic at the expense of plot. Any comments much appreciated. Thanks in advance.


	12. Chapter Twelve

“ _Do?_ ” Peter repeated, his voice sharp. “You’re not thinking of calling the cops on them?”

“We can’t do that,” came the voice.

Peter’s, “Good,” collided with the woman’s, “They’ve all bought tickets.”

“ _Tick_ …oh, right.”

The weekend days of the convention were open to the public, the ticket-buying public, who wanted to listen to their favorite detective fiction writers on panels or at discussions or in interviews…or even meet them. Mike remembered the mental note to self he’d made about getting passes for Micky and Davy—he’d told them last night he had a feeling their further help might be needed.

“When isn’t it, to get you out of a jam?” Micky had sighed, shutting up when Mike had provided a list of all the jams Micky had gotten into all by himself and into which he’d dragged the others.

“…deeply regret this lapse, that the anonymity you requested has been breached. You have our abject apologies, of course, and if there is anything…” the receptionist continued.

Mike shifted, not knowing what to say.

Peter narrowed his eyes him. “You knew,” he muttered, covering the speaker part of the phone.

“That word had gotten out, yeah,” Mike admitted. “I was going to tell you. We’d better skedaddle. Grab our stuff and beat feet out the back door?”

“Mr. Thompson?” the voice on the phone repeated. “As I say, we’re not sure how to proceed?”

It seemed Peter was. “Tell them I’m on my way down.”

Mike grabbed his arm. “Peter, you can’t—”

“Yes, that’s wrong, sorry.” Peter spoke to the receptionist. “ _We’ll_ be right down. Bye.” Peter replaced the phone on its cradle and faced Mike.

Mike raised an eyebrow. “And that’s you talking things through with me, as partners, not making unilateral decisions, is it?”

“Oh, _fuck_. I’m sorry. You’re right.”

He probably did forget, Mike supposed, wrapping a hand around Peter’s nape to pull him in for a quick kiss. “Try and remember, huh?”

“Yes. But we can’t run. We’ll get a bad reputation. He will. She will.” Peter looked as confused as he did when Micky called him slow. “The awards dinner is tonight. And her publisher’s here, for one thing.”

“We should have met him!” Mike couldn’t believe he’d only now thought of that. Well, presumably Wade would have had a meeting with the guy yesterday, if Mike and Peter had arrived before the panel discussion started. Or hung around after. Wade and his ‘agent’ had no doubt been seated at the publisher’s table for the dinner last night.

“And if it seems Wade is snubbing the people who buy his products, he could get dropped from the company.”

“There are other publishing houses,” Mike argued.

“All of which are probably attending and will see this. And word spreads. Seemingly.” His tone was pointed. “Why didn’t you say?”

“I got distracted,” Mike mumbled.

“By what?”

“Last night. You, in that beard and those pants astride that motorbike.”

“Wh—” Peter had gone wide-eyed

“I’m not proud of it, okay?” But Peter’s delighted laughter pulled a rueful chuckle from Mike.

“So whenever you’re mad about something, to get you side-tracked, all I have to do is put on tight pants—”

“And an open-necked shirt.” _Might as well make a full confession._ He caught the gleam in Peter’s eye. “Oh, as if you don’t know, you goddamn tease! But look, this…”

Peter reached for the printed convention papers from the bedside table. “We just go down to the conference, find the table or booth or whatever for…Jennings & Mercer Publishing, look, and I shake a few hands. Maybe sign a few books.”

“Maybe get a few photos taken…” Mike pursed his lips as Peter got out of bed and stretched. “In which case, you’d better get some clothes on.” Preferably a winter coat and hat. Or a blanket, a corner wrapped around his head, too. God, he was _way_ too possessive of Peter. He took a deep breath, determined to let his jealousy go. He had nothing to be green-eyed about. Peter had chosen to be with him just as Mike had with him. Peter loved him as much as Mike loved Peter. He hoped.

“Yeah.” If Mike was answering himself, Peter didn’t seem to think it weird. “I’d better get ready too,” Mike muttered.

After showering in his room, he left off the jacket and vest, keeping the button-down shirt and tie and smart pants. _Hmm, not a bad look_. Peter seemed to think so too, judging by his expression when Mike knocked on his door for him.

“Lost your glasses?” he asked Mike, who nodded. “Here.” Peter fitted a pair with darkened lenses onto Mike’s face for him. They weren’t quite twins with Peter’s but they matched.

‘“Outta sight,”’ Mike deadpanned.

“Guess’en we’d best’n mosey,” Peter replied.

Mike stared. “Did you actually _read_ the books?”

Peter shrugged. “Skimmed through them. Just to solve the mysteries, you know? And I have a question. Can you really ride a horse?”

“Can I… _Huh_?”

“Ah. So you haven’t read _Unlucky Seven_ , about Kincaid’s friend in the Mounted Police? When his friend gets shot, and Kincaid leaps onto the back of his horse to chase the shooter down the busy traffic-choked Manhattan street?”

“Can’t say as I’ve had that pleasure.” Strolling from the elevator, Mike smelled coffee and halted, then steered Peter to the Breakfast Station. At least they’d get a hot drink and a donut, if nothing else. He passed Peter his ID badge, pinning his own on so they both passed muster with the uniformed man guarding the counter. “Oh, and is this some set-up to a gag? You gonna ask me about riding and…” He was chuckling too much to go on, Peter protesting it was real as they both refuelled.

Mike tucked a couple of napkin-wrapped slices of banana bread into his pocket for later. If today turned out anything like yesterday, they might not the chance to stop for lunch. _Or dinner._ He pointed at his own mouth, to tell Peter he had a crumb in his mustache. Peter still wasn’t used to it.

“Hey, they must have been exaggerating—this lobby’s not full.” Mike indicated the trickle of people making their way in, his hopes soaring. “Talk about a panic over nothing. Come on. Let’s find your desk or cubicle or whatever in the Rose Room.”

“Sir?” A receptionist sidled up to them before they reached the main atrium. From her pounce, she’d been looking out for them. “We’ve opened up the Lily Room for your fans. This way, please.”

“Ah.” Mike and Peter followed and exchanged glances at the line snaking out of and through the convention room. It was much bigger than the knots of people milling around the decked-out kiosks set up in there. The people forming the line were all young, mostly guys, and sure, a few had longer hair or weren’t that smartly dressed, explaining the comment they caught, as they were no doubt intended to, about _a bunch of hippies_.

“That’s not the correct collective noun, you dig,” Peter called over to the speaker, one of the writers who’d been making disparaging comments on the platform yesterday.

“Yeah, call yourself a writer?” Mike added. “Everyone knows it’s a protest of hippies.”

“Or a manifestation of free men.” Peter tutted.

“Right on!” called someone and Peter flashed him a peace sign as they walked across the room.

“Isn’t it a trip of hippies?” Mike queried.

“According to Micky. Davy said a commune of hippies,” Peter reminded him.

God, the four-way riffing in the pad, when they were too broke to go out anywhere… “Say, let’s ask the audience.” Mike steered Peter right into the midst of the group waiting in the small salon, mainly so he could avoid the elderly suited and booted guy behind the booth, squeezed out by visitors, who could only be Wade Thompson’s publisher.

“Yeah, come on in, guys.” Peter beckoned to those waiting, and they entered as one, crowding the room further. The atmosphere was hushed, with the throng nudging one another and pointing but trying not to be seen doing so, at the two Monkees. “Hi! Hey, collective noun for hippies, anyone?”

“A… _patchouli_ of hippies?” suggested one guy.

“Nice.” Peter nodded, shaking the guy’s hand.

“A joint?” called a smaller guy. “Hey, is this going in the next book?”

“Could be!” Peter grinned and high-fived him.

“A festival of hippies!” “A freedom of hippies!” and “A bong!” were all offered up, the crowd getting into it, whooping and hollering, someone playing a mouth organ and someone else the panpipes.

“I’ll, erm, just… Later?” The pale-faced older guy manning the kiosk jerked a thumb at the door and was gone.

Peter smiled at the crowd in general. “Let’s sit?” He folded cross-legged to the floor, everyone following suit and making themselves comfortable, in a circle. Another formed outside it, the two concentric rings like some kids’ game.

“Where’s your cat, man?” queried the person next to Peter.

“Erm…” Peter tried to stall.

_Did Hart have a—_ A Persian! “Fat fluffy blue thing,” he muttered to Peter. “Goes to the coffee houses with him.”

“And where’s your German Shepherd? Because just as Wade is Hart, you’re Kincaid, right?” called someone else, from his place opposite Mike.

Mike glanced at Peter, then at the wide-eyed mass. “I don’t actually have a dog. Wouldn’t mind, none.”

“He _is_ a Texan!” gasped someone.

“And you could tell that without the bolo tie?” Peter quipped, to cheers and hollers.

Questions and comments came thick and fast, both Peter and Mike trying their best to provide answers.

“We heard the books are being bought for movies. Is that true?” gasped a young woman.

“Nothing concrete,” answered Mike, remembering he was supposed to be some sort of agent. “Oh, and there’s talk of TV too.”

“Please don’t let them change the pairing!” begged a voice, the plea taken up by others.

“Do you know how important the books are?” asked a man to Mike’s right, his face screwed up with earnestness. He twirled a Stetson around in his hands, Mike saw, his heart sinking.

“Important?”

Mike could tell from Peter’s tone he didn’t think so, just as he himself didn’t. The stories might be well-written and well-researched, but when all was said and done, they were just made-up puzzles, designed for entertainment. But that tightness in Mike’s stomach was back.

“To see people like ourselves, man!” the questioner continued. “It’s so good to see our community represented.”

The tightness was a growing ball of tension now.

“ _Ourselves?_ Our community?” Peter asked, and it was like lighting a touch paper.

“Queer, dude!” a guy wearing odd socks cried, opening the floodgates as Peter and Mike swung their heads from speaker to speaker, trying to keep up with all the organizations and group represented in the room, from Gay Youth Movement to Forefront, described as a society for Gay and Lesbian Rights, to LAH, the Los Angeles Homophiles, and Gay Liberation, a gay political organization. Leaflets, newsletters and even magazines and newspapers were passed around and to them.

Mike felt exposed under the weight of the stares directed at him. At him and Peter. “Wait a minute.” He held up a hand, trying to stem the activists’ flow.

‘“A cotton-filled minute?”’ called a voice and people giggled and laughed.

“Huh. Good one, yeah. Look, you’re reading into the books, seeing what’s not there. Nowhere in the series does it state that Kincaid and Hart are lovers.”

“They’re not,” called a guy. “At least not yet. And oh, the sweet agony of their sexual tension, man!”

 “But it’s so obvious Hart and Kincaid are in love, and that’s _beautiful_.” The guy Peter had high-fived clapped.

 “Yeah!” a dozen voices echoed, and people cheered.

“And you know what would be even more beautiful?” asked the guy. “If the community had a prominent face. A speaker whose voice was _heard_ , man!”

 And faces turned to them, like flowers to the sun.

“They’re right,” Peter muttered. “A cause like that, like this, I mean, it needs someone to represent it.”

“Well, that can hardly be you, now, can it, _Wade_?” Mike pointed out.

“Why not? Because it will hurt sales?” jeered a voice.

Mike hadn’t even thought of that. But he doubted it, if the bulk of Wade’s readers were gay men and women.

“Jeopardize a movie or TV deal?” cat-called someone else.

_Yeah, more likely._ But, like any possible impact on the books winning the awards, that wasn’t the point.

“I’d like to help.” Peter nodded. “If I can, I will…talk it over,” he finished, catching Mike’s glare, clearly remembering in time about their agreement to talk things out between them and come to mutual decisions.

“Good nick-of-time save there, shotgun.” Mike stood and pulled Peter to his feet.

The circles parted for the two of them to exit.

“Oh.” Peter turned back at the door. “The actual collective noun for hippies? Is a freak-out.”

_Figures._ It fitted. Least, Mike was trying not to, wondering what on earth could save them both from this twist.


	13. Chapter Thirteen

Micky often said Peter’s heart was in the right place, just that his brain tended to go its own way. Like orbiting Jupiter. He’d tried calling Peter Io at one point, but the nickname hadn’t stuck, mainly as no one had got it. Thank the Lord Micky’s astronomy phase hadn’t lasted. All his clambering up onto the roof with various bits of homemade equipment had been a stone drag. Mike sneaked a look at Peter as they headed in the opposite direction to the reception and lobby, into the heart of the hotel.

“Not here,” he urged, seeing Peter was about to talk. Seeing a snappily dressed guy with a woman assistant trying to catch up with them, Mike swerved their direction, taking them down a shorter corridor. He didn’t know how to deal with any offers from TV network or movie production company hustlers. The glass door at the end of that corridor led outside, so they took it, stepping out into a courtyard walkway, with a flight of stone steps at one end. Mike suspected where it led before he reached them, but was pleased to find a flag-stoned courtyard space below with the hotel pool in its middle.

“Wow.” Peter took in the Mediterranean vibe, with its arches and alcoves and the two vine-strewn cabana-type bars, one on either side of the water, amidst the recliners and sunbeds. The architecture seemed designed to make it look as un-hotel-pool-like as could be, and even the curve of sun-glinting skyscrapers in the distance on one side didn’t look too jarring. “Think we’ll have a house with its own pool one day?”

Mike indicated the only niche that wasn’t occupied. No surprise as it didn’t contain a sunbed mattress on a bench, just a huge potted palm on a sandstone plinth. They sat on the warm stone under the shade of the waving fronds. “In Santa Monica?”

“Umm, Laurel Canyon?” Peter answered, breaking off a strand of long leaf and playing with it.

“That what you want?” It probably was, Mike thought. “Better get a lawyer to negotiate back alimony when Elizabeth sells those movie rights, then.”

Peter lifted his glasses slightly and turned to him. “Some people might actually think like that. Especially if they thought they had a claim to, say, inspiring the books.”

It had occurred, but Mike didn’t dignify it with an answer. Not from Peter’s point of view or his own. He shook his head as a bartender approached from the cabana on their side of the pool. “Would you accept anything?” he asked Peter, guessing he already knew the answer. “If Elizabeth wins these awards, gets megabucks screen deals, and offers something?”

“Probably not.”

“ _I_ would.”

“You w—”

“The German Shepherd.” Mike wasn’t kidding.

Peter took off his dark glasses and grinned. “Not enthused about the cat?”

“Nah. Or the horse. Peter…” Mike shoved his sunglasses onto the top of his head. “You can’t be their spokesman. You can’t make that scene, man. You’re not Wade, because he doesn’t exist. It’s deception. It would hurt the cause.”

“I…know.” Peter pulled the frond taut between his thumbs, then brought his thumbs to his mouth and blew. Mike was pleased palm leaves didn’t make trumpets like blades of grass did. “And I hate deception.”

“Seems she always gets you involved in some trickery or another.”

“I…guess.”

“Hey.” Mike wished he could wrap an arm around Peter. He hated to see him like that. He let himself imagine a society, a world where they could embrace or show affection in public, like that guy and woman across from them on the pool’s edge, dangling their feet in the water, their hands clasped. They were sitting so close to each other she was practically on his lap. “There’s no wilful deceit in you. You have a good heart and act from decent motives.”

“I don’t like this dishonesty, no.” The sun beat down on them and Peter pushed his sleeves up. “I know I agreed, but…I should learn to think something all the way through first.”

“No one can do that.” Mike tried hard enough, but it was never possible. “And I know you want to reveal the truth but that ain’t our call, now. You got into this to protect your lady, so that’s what we have to do.”

Peter scrunched his brow. “I don’t think I’ve heard you say anything so, well, _Texan_ ,” he observed. “Has all this Kincaid stuff made you regress? Is it going to be all chili cook-outs and rodeos from now on?”

“It can be.” Mike bit back a laugh. “I can take you to a place that’s got down-home cookin’ and a mechanical bull.”

“Oh, where you went with Micky? Yes, you did promise. And you have to return the books. When are you going to tell me what you had to do for them?”

“Hoping never. But if our gigs dry up, well, we might all be slapping on chaps and lariat necklaces and changing the group name to work there incognito.”

“You’re cute when you try to distract me.” Peter flicked the palm frond over Mike’s wrist where he had it clasped over his crossed ankles. He ducked as someone dived into the pool and a bit of the splash hit them where they sat. “But we have to decide what to do, and right now. I agree, we can’t carry on with the lie and have ‘Wade’ step up. But we can’t expose that the ‘author’ doesn’t exist. It’s not our decision, no. Should we ring Elizabeth again?”

Mike betted that even if they could get in touch with her—and she hadn’t returned Peter’s call—she wouldn’t want the real, female, writer of the books revealed. Not when she’d set the whole thing up to hide it. This was her main source of income. She’d said she couldn’t put it at risk.

Mike closed his eyes. It wasn’t so much at the bright orange of the sun or the fresh green of the over-watered palm jarring with the chlorine of the over-blue water, but at the thought of the woman unable to earn her own living, having to give up her life in New York and, for all Mike knew, claiming that Peter had robbed her of it and now had to support her. His imagination raced, seeing Elizabeth relocating to LA and coming to live in the pad with them between her journeys and trips.

“Mike?”

Mike had often pondered on the nature of the weird ability the four of them had to share fantasies. It wasn’t confined to them being in the pad, he’d learned, and he had no reason to suppose it wouldn’t work here. He fought to push it away.

“What are you thinking?”

“To use a Texanism, that we best skedaddle?”

 “I know you’re joking.” Peter shaded his eyes to look at him. “We can’t just leave. That would hurt Zizi and hurt people. Our people.”

“ _Our…_ ” Mike shook his head. “I… _Labels_ , shotgun. And I don’t know that one fits. We both…dig chicks, too.”

 “Yes,” Peter agreed. He edged a little nearer. “But you’ve been with men before?”

 “Well, yeah?”

“I mean, in a relationship.”

“We’re doing this now?” Events had prompted it, Mike guessed. Made them think, question… “One.” What answer had Peter been expecting?

“But you’ve had sex with other men. Not just—”

_Fooling around, jacking off and getting jacked off by a friend._ “So we are doing this now. Yeah. In the air force. On the base.”

“Yes, it sounds it. Base.”

“Ha-ha.” Mike took the sunglasses from Peter’s hand where Peter was fiddling with them. He sensed this wasn’t supposed to be a one-way q and a. “You?”

“At boarding school. Not much choice, there.”

“Huh. Like the air force.”

“College,” Peter said, his voice more certain. “That was your relationship! Should I be jealous?”

“ _You?_ Not of anything, babe.”

“Do you want to talk about it?”

Mike shook his head. “Hell, no.” When Peter waited, eyebrows raised, he added, “It was messy.”

“It ended badly?”

“A mess and a half.”

“College.” Peter sat back against the wall, brushing against Mike. “It shouldn’t count.”

Mike sat back too, stretching out his legs over the length of the plinth. “Or we get a do-over?”

Peter grinned, acknowledging the reference to his time as a student. “Why not.”

_We’re all three of us college drop-outs, me, Pete and Mick_ , _and Davy didn’t finish his professional apprenticeship._ Mike knew that, had pondered on it being a sign of the times, or of their similar personalities, of the characteristics they had in common that made them such good friends. He wondered if things would have been different if they’d finished their degrees and training. Would they have still met? And…did Peter wish he was studying? Reading for a degree in music, perhaps?

“Do you get bored playing bass so much in the band?” Mike blurted out.

“Sometimes.” Peter looked startled by his equally blurted-out answer.

“You’re a better guitarist than me. Heck, better musician. We—”

“Why I like playing keyboards and banjo in the group too.” Peter ignored the rest of Mike’s outburst. “And singing harmonies and lead vocals. And arranging songs. And writing songs. Why, are you gonna introduce the French horn?”

Mike’s laughter had him sliding against Peter’s shoulder, where they both sat close, leaning against the wall.

“ _Faggots_ ,” hissed a guy walking past, his mouth pinched.

“Delicious with mushy peas, apparently,” called Peter in the man’s wake. “Oh and gravy. Don’t forget the gravy.” He huffed out a chuckle.

Mike still found it amusing too, the way they’d all fallen silent one meal time when Davy confessed a thing he really missed about home was proper English faggots. “All juicy and tender. Burst on the tongue. Melt in the mouth.” It had taken a few minutes before they’d figured out he meant a sort of spicy meatball. Now, though, this? Here? It added to the weight of what they had to do. Whatever that was.

“Come on.” He stood and reached down for Peter. “We’d better get back in there and wrap this up.”

“How? I can’t help the people who are asking me to.”

“I know.”

“And we can’t say why.”

“Yup. Know that too. So whatever we’re gonna do will hurt and let someone down. Couldn’t be much worse.”

“Sirs?”

The voice, soft and deferential, had Mike spinning to see a uniformed page behind him, trying to get their attention. A chill ribboned down Mike’s spine.

“J.D. Stevens and his publisher, Carlton Rivers, explained you needed the stage in the Rose Room, to make an announcement?” The kid looked from Mike to Peter. “It’s all ready for you now. And your fans are seated and waiting?”

_The old bastard. Must have been still smarting from yesterday and heard what was going on and—_

“Well, what do you know? It _could_ be much worse.” Peter turned and started walking at the employee’s gesture.

“Yeah. Could be played out in public. Oh wait. It is.” Mike followed, his steps slow and dragging, although his brain was buzzing, planning, scheming, figuring… But crank and fire as it might, he couldn’t come up with anything to get them out of this, and a look at Peter’s wide eyes told Mike Peter couldn’t either. _Well, hot holy damn._

“Where’s Micky with a smoke bomb when you need him?” Peter muttered.

“Not here. That’s for sure,” Mike told him.


	14. Chapter Fourteen

Mike wanted to turn tail and run when he saw the massed fans on the rows of chairs in front of the stage in the room he and Peter had been in yesterday. And like yesterday, a couple of journalists and reporters lurked, summoned, Mike had no doubt by the petty, vengeful Stevens, seeing his fame and success eclipsed.

The fans clapped and cheered when Peter appeared. He gave a slight wave and eyed the stage. “I wish I had my banjo. Or guitar. Even the damn French horn. I’d give them a song.”

Mike was ashamed that he scanned the rows of people to see if anyone had a guitar he could borrow. No, but someone had a bag of fortune cookies they were passing along their row. It came to him and Peter where they stood at one end, trying to make their feet carry them to the front of the room. Peter took one and thanked the guy.

“I love fortune cookies,” he said.

“They know,” Mike told him, thinking of how the books’ chapter started with cookie quotes, some of which, he was prepared to bet, Elizabeth made up herself.

“What’s it say, man?” a fan inquired.

‘“Life is not a mystery to be solved but a reality to be experienced,”’ Peter replied, tucking it into his pocket. “I’m keeping that one.”

People hooted and hollered. The elderly man from earlier, Wade’s publisher, came up, almost trembling, and Mike waved him away. _Too late._

“Mr. Thompson?” J.D. Stevens took time out from meeting and greeting and trying to sell books to his readers to stand in the doorway, arms folded. “Don’t keep your public waiting!”

“We had to consult with our advisor, Mr. Schneider.” Peter gave the excuse they used on creditors, officials and bureaucrats everywhere.

“And?” prompted the elderly guy with Stevens, his publisher no doubt. “What did he say?”

“Nothing. He’s a dummy.” Mike gave the punchline, glad that hadn’t found its way into the Lower Manhattan series, although Hart had a habit of talking to posters and photographs of people he liked or admired. He indicated the platform they were both standing in front of. “Peter, I’ll go up and say something. Make some speech.”

“What?” Peter stared at the audience that was starting to twist and turn in their seats, looking confused at what was going on—or not going on.

“I don’t know yet. But I do know that ‘before the beginning of great brilliance, there must be chaos.”’

“Huh?”

“Nothing. It’s in _Twice Shy_ ,” Mike muttered.

Peter caught his arm. “Let me. I’m Wade. Well, more Wade than you are.”

“But I’m the hero.” Mike jerked his chin at a book cover visible in someone’s hand, the dark-haired man staring out from it as if mocking them both. “You’re the sidekick.”

“Hey!”

“Fine, unofficial partner,” Mike conceded.

“Let’s choose for it.”

“Choosies?”

“Yes, choose fingers. I’m evens.”

“Guess that leaves me odds. Okay.” Mike flexed his trigger hand. “One, two, three, shoot!” He splayed out two fingers, Peter one. As usual. “I win. And no best out of three.”

“Fine. You might be speaking, but I’m going up there with you. And remember, ‘all things are difficult before they are easy’. _Triple Threat_.”

“Elizabeth’s gonna run out of titles soon,” Mike mused, nudging Peter forward.

The reporter snapped to attention as Mike and Peter made their way the stage. Applause rang, along with cheers and whoops. The black author from yesterday called out encouragement as they passed him, and Mike noticed several of the other writers hanging around. He cleared his throat.

“Howdy, y’all.” Mike wanted to scrunch his face up. He never said that. The damn books were taking him over. “I’m M— John…” He froze. That wasn’t it. He’d forgotten his damn fake name!

“You’re Kincaid!” shouted half-a-dozen voices.

“Is John your first name? We never learn it!” called a pretty girl.

“Names don’t matter.” Mike took a breath. “Look, your movement, your organizations, they’re important. Vital. But you don’t need a figurehead—you need an organizer. And just because P—”

“ _Wade,_ ” corrected Peter, at his side.

“Thanks. Just because Wade’s prominent doesn’t mean he’s an organizer.”

Boos started.

“Look, would you want your movement led by someone who can’t even organize his own damn sock drawer?” Mike tried.

“Hey, sock symmetry’s _your_ hang-up, dude!” cried a guy wearing mismatched socks.

 “Bogus, man! You’re a sell-out!” was yelled.

“Hey!” Peter caught the fortune cookie thrown at him and snapped it in two. “Oh. This one says, ‘your fortune is in another cookie’. Huh.”

“This decision is nothing to do with Wade.” Mike stepped in front of Peter before anything else was hurled. Still leaning in the doorway, Stevens was smirking up a storm. Mike arranged his face to glare back, making his features promise vengeance. “It’s on me. I won’t let him.”

People were standing by now, hissing their disapproval. “Who’re you to tell him what to do?” called a guy.

_Fair point._ “Well, I’m…” Mike had no way to finish the sentence.

“He’s…” Peter took up the baton. And just as promptly and dropped it.

What would Micky do? Mike was ashamed to find himself thinking.

“I don’t think a James Cagney impersonation’s going to get us out of this one,” Peter muttered. He stepped forward into the line of fire, well, of calls and whistles. “I’m—”

“ _Stop!_ ” commanded a voice and a hotel maid rushed into the fray.

“Oh, thank fuck,” breathed Mike. “Let’s—what?” He stared where Peter was, at the woman in the brown and white hotel uniform. She looked familiar… “That’s—”

“Elizabeth?” gasped Peter.

“Stop this at once!” she demanded, sprinting to the stage, vaulting up to stand between Mike and Peter and turning to address the rows of chairs. “I’ve gatecrashed this bastion of male privilege, this, this gentleman’s club, to which women are only allowed in a servile capacity, in a disguise, turning the tools of tyranny against the oppressors and… Yes?” She broke off her impassioned speech to point at the woman in the audience who’d raised her hand.

“You could just have bought a ticket, like I did,” the woman said. Noises of agreement came from other women seated in the audience and the murmurs of the crowd intensified.

“Or even just come in with your agent or publisher,” Mike muttered. The guy was right there, looking even more horrified than before, if that were possible.

“That, that doesn’t invalidate my protest!” Elizabeth called. “Because this industry is inherently sexist in its conservatism! Wait,” she added, yanking the elasticated white cotton cap from her head and releasing her layers and bangs of hair. “This is making me itch,” she complained as she tugged at the buttons down the front of her uniform and pulled the two sides apart. She looked up at the whistles from the audience.

Mike hoped to high heaven Elizabeth was wearing more than a bra and panties under the brown uniform dress. He also wondered how she’d gotten it—was there a maid lying in her slip unconscious in a linen closet somewhere? Peter shrugged an _I don’t know_ at him. Mike breathed out a sigh of relief as Elizabeth’s own sleeveless, pale yellow not-quite-knee-length dress was revealed by her impromptu striptease.

“I have found the strength to refuse to live a lie any longer. It’s time for the truth to be known,” Elizabeth shouted.

Mike put a hand on her arm. He owed it to Peter, if not the woman herself. “Wait. Letting the cat outta the bag is a whole lot easier than putting it back in. Think of your sales. Your career.”

Elizabeth patted his hand and Mike dropped it. “No. Truth matters more than commerce. And on that subject, the monolithic nature of the industry is to blame. It stifles creative urges and has a stranglehold on the market. New authors are told to emulate older ones and existing styles, and this they do, consciously or even subconsciously mimicking tired, played-out themes and templates, even if this says nothing about their lives or reality. It’s very hard for writers who are even a little bit different to be heard.”

“Right on!” yelled an audience member.

“Particularly those writers who are more in tune with current social ills, for instance.” She stopped and acknowledged the cheers this received. “And I have been guilty of conforming, of deceiving.”

She shook a little, and Mike helped her to sit on the edge of the stage. Peter sat next to her, and Mike at his side.

“But I’m here to confess the truth. I call myself a feminist, but I’ve hidden in men’s shadows for too long. Men like my husband.” She took Peter’s hand, her wedding ring catching the light. “I’ve hidden behind him, in fact.”

“Zizi—”

She ignored him. “I’m the writer you know as Wade Thompson. I was told to take on a male pen name, so I took his. Sort of.” She looked up at the gasps and exclamations coming from the listeners and shook her head at her publisher holding his hands in prayer position, obviously signaling her to stop.

“But the books are about him!” shouted a guy.

Elizabeth nodded. “Yes, I had to write about him because he fascinates me. He always has, right from the first day I met him. I was the last one in the Arts and Crafts room, trying to make a damn macaroni necklace, and I couldn’t. He stuck his head in the window, then swung himself in and tied a knot in the cord for me, and jumped back out again. He’s good with knots.”

Mike supressed a snigger. That should’ve warned her.

Elizabeth waited for the _awwws_ to die down. “He lives his own life. He doesn’t compromise. He always thought he wasn’t smart enough for me. Well, let me tell you, he’s more than smart enough.”

“You’ve gone off the point a little there,” a blushing Peter told her.

“But she’s right,” Mike muttered to him.

“So you’re happily married?” questioned one of the Gay Youth Movement.

“Happily divorced,” Elizabeth corrected, and Peter nodded.

“But you love him!” asked the woman who’d spoken before.

“Of course I do.” Elizabeth indicated Peter, as if that proved it. Kinda did, to Mike’s way of thinking.

“Wait.” Stevens broke the hush that had descended while people were trying to figure things out and came down to the stage. “You claim _you_ write those silly, gimcrack books?”

The crowd sent up a belligerent mutter, but at the questioner, not at Elizabeth’s proud nod.

“Prove it,” snapped Stevens.

“While it doesn’t matter who writes those, or any books, you can ask me anything about them,” Elizabeth offered. “From the brand of cat food Al-Ashab, known as Ash, prefers, to the choices of relishes available at Klutz’s deli, or the records in Hart’s collection. Which he catalogs by color of sleeve, not name of artist, of album.”

Mike bit back a laugh. She did know Peter’s quirks.  

“Or…I can prove it to you by reading to you from the latest, _Dime a Dozen_.”

“Isn’t the new one _Ten a Penny_ —oh.” Mike understood when Elizbeth pulled a sheaf of papers from the pocket of the maid’s uniform by her side. “Still in handwritten form.”

She didn’t wait but launched into her reading. She set the scene well. Mike could smell the roasting beans in the coffee house, hear the tune Hart was picking out on his acoustic and…understand the feelings burgeoning between the two men. Kincaid couldn’t take his eyes off Hart, for all Kincaid, still lying low in the Village to avoid the vengeance of the remnants of the mob he’d bust up in a previous book, was supposed to be helping him manage the coffee shop Hart now seemed to own or be running.

A huge sigh came from the listeners when Elizabeth finished.

“More!” someone pleaded, the cry taken up by dozens of voices.

“When is this out?” called a guy.

The Jennings & Mercer publisher, until now cowering, his eyes shut tight and his head hanging low, uncurled and raised his head, and a three men, network or movie people by their expensive, fashionable clothes, were salivating.


	15. Chapter Fifteen

“When’s it going to be published? I’m not sure,” Elizabeth answered.

Judging by the dollar signs in her publisher’s eyes, Mike guessed as soon as possible.

“And really? More?” Elizabeth asked, her eyes shining.

“ _Yes!_ ” yelled the crowd.

“Oh, okay! Here’s a bit I just finished, on the plane, actually. It’s a little, well, _charged_ , I suppose one could say.”

That got wild wolf-whistles and mad clapping.

“I might need help?” Elizabeth wriggled into place between Peter and Mike and turned over a few pages. The scene was different. Made suspicious by Hart’s cagy behavior, Kincaid had secretly followed him one night, to get the shock of his life on seeing his unofficial partner meeting with dangerous criminal lowlifes. As soon as Hart was alone, taking a shortcut through a dark alley, a tall figure detached itself from the shadows and blocked his path.

“What the hell do you think you’re doin’?” Mike read.

“Christ Almighty!” Hart clutched his chest. “What am I _doing_? I’m walking, man. Or at least I was, until you—”

“Don’t bother workin’ the little-lost-choir-boy routine on me.” Kincaid indicated Hart in his unfamiliar suit and with his hair slicked back. “Buying drinks and playin’ poker in the Down and Brown? You were meetin’ with Nils and Inky-Blue. That’s their turf. So I repeat, what the hell do you think you’re doin’ there, slick?”

“Saving your stubborn southern ass is what I’m doing!” Hart exploded.

“My ass don’t need your saving!” Kincaid yelled back. He stood toe-to-toe with the blond. “I know you’re eager to track down the Romano brothers so I can get out of your apartment, out of your life, but don’t you ever go do anything like that ever again, y’hear?” Mike read, following where Elizabeth ran her finger along the page.

“That wasn’t why— You can’t tell me what to do!” Peter-as-Hart snapped, and pushed past Kincaid, who, enraged, shoved him against the wall with a thump.

“Don’t _ever_ challenge me again, buddy,” Kincaid warned, raising a finger at Hart.

Hart knocked it away. “And if I do?” He stepped forward and pushed Kincaid, hard, thudding him against the opposite wall and boxing him in. “If I do?” he repeated, his voice low.

“Like that, is it?” Kincaid said, grabbing Hart by the lapels to reverse their positions. He slammed a palm flat against the alley wall, level with Hart’s head.

“Like that…” Hart repeated, his eyes locked with Kincaid’s and his voice slow and low.

Kincaid brought up his other hand, caging Hart in.

 “Like…that.” Hart licked his bottom lip.

Kincaid couldn’t stop his gaze following the movement of that pink tongue tip.

“You’re not angry with me!” Hart’s tone was one of discovery. “You’re—”

“Thinking about you,” Kincaid finished for him, his voice a whisper. “I’m always thinking about you. And goddamnit, I don’t know what to do about it!”

Mike shifted a little as they finished, trying not to catch Peter’s eye over Elizabeth’s head. He betted Peter had been as affected as him and—

“ _More!_ ” The audience’s vociferous demand rang to the rafters.

“That’s as far as I got with that scene.” Elizabeth bit her lip, holding up the pages in proof. “But there’s some comic business coming up with Hans the German Shepherd undercover as a police dog who deliberately gets the boot from the K-9 unit so he can infiltrate a gang of drug runners?”

“Zizi.” Peter shook his head, watching and listening to the crowd react to that. “How long are you staying?”

“Oh, I’m here for the gala dinner later. I want everyone to know who Wade is.” Seemed when Elizabeth committed, it was one hundred percent. Mike approved. “I’d be honored if you’d escort me.” She addressed her words to both of them.

“And we’d be honoured if you’d escort us,” Peter replied, after a look at Mike.

“Or we’d be honoured to escort you,” Mike added, wondering if the woman had a dinner dress on under her day dress.

“Good! I want to talk to you. I think Lower Manhattan’s a bit played out and have an idea about Kincaid taking a case in Los Angeles! It could even be a subseries, if Hart gets a residency at a nightclub and…”

Mike thought he knew how her publisher felt. He wanted to screw up his eyes and stick his fingers in his ears, too. He just hoped they got through the fancy dinner okay.

They almost didn’t. Oh, not because of any threat or danger, just that Peter was wearing his tuxedo. With its sweet little jacket, cut and fitted deliberately and _cruelly_ , Mike felt, to show off Peter’s ass…ets. And the glint in his eye that told Mike Peter knew very well how the sight of his toned legs in those formal trousers and the way his black bowtie looked on his white dress shirt affected Mike.

“So this is the Crime and Detective Writers of America Biennial Awards.” Micky, equally nicely attired, surveyed the sumptuous ballroom. “The old CADWABA, eh?”

Davy, in that pink tux only he could pull off, laughed. “As if you care. You’re only here for the dinner and drinks.”

“And to support Elizabeth!” Micky insisted.

Mike eyed him, a brow raised.

“And to maybe talk to Mr. Mercer here about my detective fiction idea.” Micky smiled at the elderly man, whose elderly wife looked just as nervous as her husband did to be at a table full of them. “It’s never been seen before! You know how all the detectives need a gimmick, now? Well, Captain Locksley Mendoza works for Star Force Elite Unit, you see, and he solves crimes in space! On ships, on planets…”

“I’m afraid we don’t carry science fiction,” whispered the man.

“It’s not science fiction.” Micky looked puzzled. “How can it be, when he’s a werewolf?” He reached for the wine from its cooler. “Let me top your glass up. The concept will be easier to understand then.”

“ _Ahem._ ” Lola threw Micky a pointed look, and after a few second’s furrowed-brow thought and a nudge and signal from Mike, he got it, filling Lola’s glass first.

“They grow up so…slowly,” Peter muttered.

“Or don’t grow…owww! Sorry, sorry!” Micky apologized to Davy for the crack, probably after Davy had kicked him hard under the table. “I’m sure Leah thinks you’re the right size. _In height!_ Jeez.”

Mike wondered who to apologize to first, Elizabeth the publisher, the other authors from that house sharing the table with them, or his bandmates’ dates. Talking of… “Who’s running the Duke Box, since we’re lucky enough to have you here?” he asked Lola, the DJ and unofficial manager, and Leah, the cloakroom attendant / unofficial talent scout.

“Jo-Ann.” Lola sipped her wine. “Oh, she’ll be fine. She can handle a lot at once.”

Micky, catching Davy’s eye, pretended to choke on his drink, and Davy thumped him on the back. Really hard.

“Sorry.” Mike made his apology to the table at large. Much the easiest way.

“Zizi, I thought we agreed no taking notes?” Peter reproved her.

She blushed and handed her pen to Peter, to tuck into his pocket. Mike caught her mouthing, _“Werewolf detective? Tell me more later?”_ at Micky. _“Don’t,”_ he mouthed at Micky in turn. There were some things the reading public just wasn’t ready for yet, and, in fact, might never be.

They all turned their chairs once more to face the bandstand at the head of the room for the final part of the ceremony after dessert had been served.

“Oh, I could do better than that!” Micky groaned at the MC, trying to make witticisms on the theme of the evening. “I’d have gone straight for the dicks.”

“Figures.” Lola sat back in her chair and folded her arms. “Whenever I meet a guy I like, he’s always—”

“What? _No!_ I meant a joke about private dicks and…a guy you like?” Micky’s eyebrows rose to his straightened hairline.

“Shhh!” the publisher begged. “It’s the big one!”

“The big di—I’ll leave it,” Micky promised, leaning forward to listen to the explanation of why this award, that for Best Private Investigator, was delayed.

“And as you know, the category for Best PI includes licensed and unlicensed PIs, the latter including such main characters as lawyers or reporters who do their own legwork. Other similar hired agents are eligible, but an investigator who is a law enforcement official hero, say, or an amateur sleuth, is not.”

Seemed about right. Mike nodded at Elizabeth.

“And so, despite a protest being lodged and attempts to get this particular hero disqualified from this category owing to his _former_ law enforcement background”—the MC stared at the Carlton Rivers table, with its consignment of wrinkled gray writers—“the committee are proud to present the award for Best Private Investigator to Wade Thompson’s former Texas Ranger and very much New York PI, Kincaid!”

Their table’s applause was the loudest and rowdiest. “You’re supposed to go up there,” Mike pointed out to Elizabeth, who say there clapping and cheering with them.

“Oh, of course! I just thought—”

But they didn’t hear what she was thinking, because the host decided to announce the next and final award too, seeing as the same writer had won both: “For the Lower Manhattan Chronicles, Wade Thompson!”

“Church is out, partner,” Micky said, jerking a thumb at the platform to get Elizabeth to move.

“It's time to heat up the bricks,” Mike agreed, standing and pulling Elizabeth’s chair out for her. It took Peter standing and giving her a gentle push to get her moving.

“What?” Mike asked, catching Peter staring at him.

“Love it when you talk Texan,” he murmured.

“I know.” Mike smirked.

“Hmm. Well, here’s one for you: a smart ass jus’ don't fit in a saddle.”

“You’re always complaining I’m obsessed with your ass, but now who’s talking about whose ass?” Mike queried, his voice still as low as Peter’s not to carry across to the chicks.

“No complaints here,” Peter denied.

“Talking of asses, shouldn’t ours be up there?” Davy indicated the stage.

“Dicks…asses,” Lola said to Leah. “See? I was right.”

“Yeah, and I heard Micky dresses as a woman, because Davy wants him to?” Leah added.

“Hey! That’s not right! _Dressed._ It was only once!” Micky protested.

“Not really helping your case, there,” Mike told him.

“Look, as soon as we’re finished, I’ll show you who’s not a woman!” Micky promised, as Davy dragged him away.

Davy, having the least to do on stage equipment-wise, helped Micky make the final adjustments to his drum kit. “You could sit on the fence and the birds would feed you, as you say in Texas,” he joked to Mike. “I mean, you’re attending this gala under false pretenses, but instead of getting kicked out, you get us a gig!”

“Ah, the place needs livening up.” Mike slung the strap of his blonde Gretsch over his shoulder. “Good evening, we’re the Monkees!” he announced into the mic. “And we wanna see everyone dancing.”

“Especially the pretty girls,” added Davy, rattling his tambourine.

_The few that there are_ , Mike thought, hitting a loud G then a C to start the intro to the first number. _And most of those were at our table anyway._ And they did dance, as did a whole heap of other dinner guests, to _Let’s Dance On_ , the first song, and then to _No Time_ and _Take A Giant Step_ and _Clarksville_ , all numbers guaranteed to get the place rocking. And if people were confused that Wade Thompson had turned into a girl who was happily divorced from a bearded hippie-looking bass player who had himself pretended to be Wade, well, that was their hang-up.

“Go easy on that.” Peter indicated the beer Mike was guzzling when they’d finished. “Don’t get too smashed.”

“I’m hardly gonna get commode-hugging, knee-walking drunk on one beer, babe. But it’s not like I have to drive.”

“I know. I know exactly where you’ll be tonight.” Peter’s eyes gleamed, He chuckled. “Only you would accept a night in the Ambassador Suite as payment for a gig!”

“The Ambassador’s Suite? Let’s just hope he doesn’t mind!” Micky, of course, before he finished Mike’s beer for him. He and Davy had already negotiated their share of the payment for the gig from Mike in the form of reduced cleaning and cooking duties. “Or he’s sharing it with you?”

“No. Just us. Because tonight you’re mine,” Peter whispered, right in Mike’s ear.

Mike shivered. “Every night, shotgun.”

“Yes, but tonight _this_ gun calls the shots.”

Peter, standing in front of him, in _that_ tuxedo saying _that_? Mike would have groaned at the awful joke if he hadn’t been so goddam horny he could burst.


	16. Chapter Sixteen

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Basically PWP.

“Elizabeth was right.” Mike exhaled, slowly.

“She tends to be. But about anything in particular?” Peter sat back to admire his work.

“This.” Mike flexed one wrist, testing the binding. “You _are_ good at knots.” He rotated his other wrist, wondering where Peter had gotten the silken cords and hoping he hadn’t ordered them from room service. He should have felt vulnerable, naked and tied to the huge four-poster bed, but instead his heart thundered and his cock filled. No danger it wouldn’t, with Peter there, in that delicious tux. As much as Mike had looked forward to stripping it from him, he had to admit Peter ripping the clothes from _him_ and pushing him down onto the soft bed had been arousing. Was arousing. _Is arousing._ The heat burning in Peter’s eyes fired Mike. “This,” Mike repeated.

They needed this, time alone, together, away from the others, away from the pad, and to be somewhere they could be as vocal as they liked. And Peter sure got vocal in his responses, and Mike liked hearing him. _Loved_ hearing him. Loved making him that way. He prided himself on having more self-control than Peter, and had an inkling that Peter knew that. Knew it and…wanted to test it. Test _Mike_. Fine by him. He was up for anything Peter wanted to do to him. "This."

“This.” Peter leaned down but didn’t immediately kiss Mike. He stroked the soft flesh of Mike’s lips with his tongue tip, mapping the contours and delineating the curves before pressing against the seam between them. Mike opened for him and Peter slipping his tongue inside, to twirl it with his, shot red-hot flame straight to Mike’s dick and balls.

“Nice.” Peter sat back and eased his jacket off, tossing somewhere into the shadows of the large, lavish room.

“Nice?” Mike forced his body not to strain at its bindings, seeking Peter’s touch. _Try frustrating, tantilizing…_

“Having you at my mercy.” Peter swirled a fingertip into Mike’s chest hair, ruffling the whorls of black fuzz but not touching the nipples. “And this dynamic, for a switch-up. You naked while I’m still clothed.”

“I beg to disagree.” Mike twitched as Peter trailed his finger down his stomach, making the muscles twitch. “And not like I _ahhh!_ plan it. It just seems to happen.” Mainly because he couldn’t spare the time it took to undress himself before he got his hands on Peter.

“Like that?” Peter blew on the nipple he’d wetted. The way it furled was sweet agony. He laughed. “I can see you did.”

Yeah, his cock was climbing high, hitting his bellybutton, threatening to leave a sticky trail.

“I’ve often thought how women can be so much more subtle, in these situations, with no huge boner to give them away. It hardly seems fair.”

Mike, fighting for control of himself, wasn’t in a place to contribute much to a philosophical discussion. “We’re cheaper,” he managed.

“Huh?”

“No woman involved—no need to buy rubbers.” Mike was amazed he sounded so coherent when all his blood had rushed south. “Planning on sketching me, or something?” he snarked, wanting to rile Peter enough to— “ _Sweet Jesus!_ ”

“Or something.” Peter, having taken Mike down to the root in one swift bob of his head, had pulled off again. Just as swiftly. “Is that enough to be going on with?”

“Hardly!” Mike would beg, if that what was it took to get Peter to blow him or jack him. Peter’s exceptional technical skills weren’t confined to the world of music, any more that those too-sexy hip movements were confined to when he played bass. And yeah, Peter had good technique in most things he did, and never used it just to show off, as Mike sometimes jokingly accused him.

“Okay…” Peter bent to work his way down Mike’s torso, licking and sucking his skin on his journey until he bit the soft skin of Mike’s groin. Mike breathed in and out heavily, trying to hold his response in, and, grinning, Peter, licked away the sting.

“You know, there’s no need for this!” Mike’s tone already held a ragged edge as he pulled against his bonds, making his meaning clear. “I’m not planning on running away.”

“But it’s your fantasy.” Peter undoing his bowtie to leave it dangling from the now unbuttoned collar of his shirt had Mike’s brain scrambled. “I saw it.”

“Saw… Oh.” True, he had imagined lying while Peter used his talented mouth on him, bringing him to the brink of pleasure before taking him over the edge but this had a twist, like the one matching Peter’s mouth as he surveyed Mike’s bindings.

“Yes. _You’re_ the one tied to the bed.”

“Yeah.” Mike tilted his head back. He might be the one tied up and at Peter’s mercy, but that still didn’t mean Peter was setting the pace. “So whatcha gonna do about it?”

“This,” Peter announced, spreading Mike’s legs wide and settling between his thighs. He nuzzled into Mike’s hair, making Mike release a sigh, then clench a hand around the silken rope imprisoning him, when Peter licked his shaft. He grabbed at the other rope when Peter licked the head of his cock.

 “Love how you taste,” Peter mused.

“Then don’t stop!”

So Peter didn’t, sliding slow lips down the length of Mike’s straining cock to suck. The silk ends of his bowtie tickled Mike’s flesh and his nerve endings. Peter’s steady, almost casually expert touch had Mike’s body trying to arch, to bring itself closer, deeper, and had his balls aching with fullness and tightness. He couldn’t bring his legs around Peter—his thighs were trembling too much. Peter’s smile when he paused and looked up told Mike what was coming, but the breath whooshed out of him anyway when Peter tongued Mike’s oversensitive sac.

“Tell me?” Peter spoke in a whisper, but it sounded loud in the still of the room, just as he shone in the small pool of light trained on them.

“Good. _God, babe._ Feels _so_ good.”

Peter returned to his licking and sucking, using both hands to stroke at the same time. The perfect blend of heat and wet and tight made desire thicken and tighten in Mike, threatening to uncoil when Peter shifted and took him deep. The pressure had Mike’s hips bucking. “Pete,” he gasped. “Gonna come.”

“ _No._ ” And with that one word, it stopped, or rather, Peter stopped it, pulling away to leave Mike howling in frustration. Not even the sight of Peter stripping off his white shirt could soothe it. He’d been so there, so almost, and then…And then Peter started again, and Mike understood. It wasn’t going to be just once.

No, Peter started Mike climbing again when he tongued, tracing with a tongue tip then licking with the flat of his tongue the full, pulsing veins on Mike’s cock. Had him halfway there when he tickled the glans and swirled over the head, holding eye contact with Mike while treating his dick like a goddamn popsicle. Mike managed a short bark of laughter. “You love those suckers. And I know…” _That you liked teasing me with them and with ice-cream cones, all those times_ was lost to the ether when Peter wiggled into Mike’s slit and applied the lightest, most infernal pressure there, treating himself to the precum his knowing actions stimulated.

And just as that coil squeezed a hold of Mike’s spine, pushing low and gathering him in, Peter called a halt again, and left him bereft, his heart thudding, his blood pounding in his ears. “Payback?” Mike gasped, when he could talk. “For when I do this to you?”

“Not exactly.” Peter was a little flushed, sweat dewing his chest, although nothing like the wash of color and sheen on Mike. “You do it to me to get me hard so I fuck you hard. I’m doing it to you to make you come hard before I fuck you harder.”

And Jesus, if that logical, rational explanation didn’t kindle even more heat in Mike. He’d thought sometimes they had an unspoken competition, some rivalry, maybe, in seeing who could take the other apart the fastest. Mike had had more techniques and tricks up his sleeve back in the beginning, but Peter had learned fast and was mighty imaginative. They were both ruthless and unafraid to play dirty. They were even. Except at the moment, with Mike trembling, his need to come so powerful.

Peter pushed off the bed and stood to strip, and Mike was elated to see him unsteady too. Peter fumbled around for the tube of K-Y, then crawled back onto and up the bed. Peter squirting gel onto his fingers thrilled through Mike, and Peter bent low to catch in his own mouth the gasp Mike made at the feel of Peter’s fingers at Mike’s hole. Peter’s fingers sliding into him had him arching as high off the bed as Peter’s torso pressing him down allowed. Then there was just sensation, Peter stroking deep inside him and using his other hand on Mike’s cock, playing with him and pulling him apart.

His entire body reacted, constricting in on itself, too tightly. He bit back a whimper. He wouldn’t—

“It’s okay. Come for me,” Peter whispered, and it didn’t take any more to unravel Mike, to tear him apart in one long shuddery moan, everything reduced to the white-hot pleasure jolting him into pure heat, no sound except his own pulse and breath. He was almost glad when it ebbed, when Peter’s fist had pulsed out Mike’s last drops and his body had fallen flat—he didn’t know if he could take much more.

When he came to more awareness, spent, drained, everything aching, Peter was undoing the knots to free him, cautioning him to move his arms slowly. Mike could barely hear. His heart was still as loud as thunder, taking ages to slow. Peter wiped him down, but he didn’t settle next to him.

“What?” Mike got out, seeing Peter sitting back on his heels, his cock massive and ready.

“You don’t think that’s it, do you? When I haven’t fucked you yet?”

“ _Jesus!_ Tryin’to killme?”

“No. If I was, I’d bring you off again.”

“Thanks? C’m'ere.” Mike calmed his breathing. He swiped a finger through a spot of cum Peter had missed and rubbed it along Peter’s lips. Peter opened his mouth and licked his lips clean, making Mike groan.

 “Want you,” Peter murmured against Mike’s lips.

“Take me then.” He wondered if Peter would. Yeah, he was hesitating, thinking Mike needed to recover. “Please?” he added. “How?” He obeyed Peter’s turn-around gesture, glad to lie down, and almost jumped when Peter nudged his thighs wider apart. He buried his face in the pillow at the feel of the cool squirt of lube on his crack. “Don’t need much,” he mumbled. “Like to feel you.”

“I know.”

Of course Peter did. Within a second, the head of his cock was at Mike’s entrance, and Mike tried to catch Peter by surprise by pushing back, forcing it through the ring of muscle in a slow push. The stretch felt too wide and too hot: just right. He curled his hands into the sheets under him and twisted his head around as far as he could for a kiss he knew Peter would be ready with. And Peter caught him out by finding Mike’s hand, level with his shoulder, and sliding his fingers through Mike’s. Mike was glad it was the left one, the one he could curl into a better fist to embrace Peter’s hold. Not that Peter cared.

Peter’s groan of pleasure came loud to Mike’s ear, and Mike understood it, feeling it himself, that intensity and fulfilment he’d tried to convey to Peter in describing anal to him. _Easier to show him._ Mike’s cock was rubbed against the cotton sheet under him with Peter’s thrusts, making it try and stir again. _Huh._ Maybe it would, then he could take Peter, then Peter him, until they fell into an exhausted sleep.

The pleasure _ached_ , was the only way he could conceptualize it, when the angle of Peter’s cock caught at his prostate. He could track Peter’s climax, feel it approach, take hold in the depth and arch of Peter’s thrust, to power through him, and into Mike. And _Jesus_ , if his cock didn’t react, playing along with a small finish of its own, without him getting a hand to it. It was almost like feeling Peter’s orgasm from the inside, along with him, with the degree of closeness they had. Especially with Peter flat on top of him like that, his heart hammering on Mike’s back, part of him, like that.

Peter soon slid off, easy to do as they’d both sweated up a storm. Mike tugged at the sheet, using a corner to wipe them and without needing to say a work, they both heaved up and along the big bed, making for a clean spot.

“ _God!_ ” Peter leaned over to use the sheet-towel to wipe his face and hair. He eyed Mike.

“Don’t you…” Mike opened his eyes that were trying to close. “Dare ask me if I’m okay.”

“Wasn’t going to.” Peter’s words were slow too. “Was gonna remind you suite has huge bathroom…huge bath. Big for two.”

“C’mon th’n.” Mike did want to bathe in a big tub with Peter. But Peter was asleep and within seconds, Mike, curling over him, was too.


	17. Chapter Seventeen

_Sunday. Hotel. Convention. Author panel. Readings. I’m John Smith. No, George St. John…_ Mike’s scramble of thoughts jolted him awake before the realization that Elizabeth was there and handling all the author duties washed over him in a warm and easy wave. Yeah, the ‘real Wade’ was in place, for interviews, discussions with whoever wanted to talk about whatever with her, and a new roundtable talk that Elizabeth had insisted on, on new directions in detective fiction writing. Mike was free.

Even without looking, he could tell Peter wasn’t in the bed with him. He could feel his absence, although Peter getting up hadn’t woken him. Well, it hadn’t in the early morning either; neither Peter getting up to clean up a little, nor when he’d come back to bed. Mike had woken to Peter, propped on one elbow on his side, looking at him.

“What?” Mike had asked, wary.

“Did you know this suite has a refrigerator?”

“No?”

“Which has…ice?” And Peter had produced a bowl full of tinkling cubes.

Mike’s skin rippled at the memory of what Peter had proceeded to do with his find. He’d have to be at Peter’s mercy more often. In bed, that was. He was at Peter’s beck and call every second, if Peter but realized it. Talking of…

“Marco?” he called.

“Polo,” came from over yonder.

Mike found an abandoned towel, wrapped it around his waist and made his way, somewhat gingerly, in that direction. Most of his muscles ached and didn’t the bathroom contain a huge tub? Just what he needed to soak his soreness away.

“Morning.” Mike wrinkled his nose at the sharp smell. Oh, the spirit gum remover thing Davy had gotten for Peter last night. He came up behind Peter and looked at his reflection in the mirror. “What, it doesn’t work?”

“Yes, it works.” Peter threw another wad of cotton wool into the waste basket and put the cap back on the small plastic bottle. He ducked his face under the tap and came up dripping…and still bearded.

Mike dabbed at Peter’s face with a towel from the rail. “You mean this real beard was growing under your false one?” It stood to reason, of course. He patted Peter dry.

“And I can’t shave right away. That stuff irritates the skin. Oh, good morning. Yeah, you’ll just have to put up with this for a day or two.”

“Lemme just see if I can wipe that patch of smug off there…” Mike threw the towel over Peter’s head, covering the smirk on his face. Little tease knew how the sight of him like that affected Mike. Well, Peter in general.

“Awww.” Peter pulled the towel free, pouting. “Does that mean you don’t want to share the bath with me?”

“I never said that!” Mike wandered over to inspect the large sunken oval in the adjoining bathroom. “Say, the Ambassador, whoever he is, must be a mighty clean fellah.”

“Oh, they all are,” Peter replied, in the tone of one who dealt with such creatures daily. “And healthy.”

“How do you figure that?” Mike turned on the gilded faucets and examined the shelf of bath products.

“They seem to eat a lot of fruit, if that basket left on the table near the door’s anything to go by.” Peter nodded approval at the small plastic bottle Mike held out for him to sniff.

Mike squirted the contents into the pouring water. “True. It looked good.”

“You mean you want breakfast in bath?”

Mike tested the temperature of the frothing water filling the tub. “Sounds fine to me. I’ll call down to room service. What do Ambassadors usually order, do you think?”

“ _Croissants_. With _Schwarzwaelder Schinken_. What? Ambassadors are very European.”

“Yeah?” Mike found more similarly scented bath oil to tip in. “Well this one’s American, so I’m going with good old pancakes.”

“Which originated in Ancient Greece.”

“What was that old saw, about a smart ass?” Mike gave it a slap as he passed on his way to the phone. “And put something on before whoever brings up the breakfast gets here!”

“Interesting experience, breakfast in bath,” he mused, a little later. “Is it a real thing? You sounded so convincing when you called it that.”

“Oh yes.” Peter’s reply came a little muffled from around the forkful of syrup-drenched pancake Mike had just fed him. A splash of topping dripped off, into the foamy water supporting them. Peter picked out a berry from the plate and fed that to Mike, then took a swallow of his herbal tea. “This…”

“What? What, babe?”

“It’s like, well, being in a honeymoon suite. Being on a honeymoon.”

“Is it? I wouldn’t know. You’re the one who’s been married. Did you have something like this, then?”

“Not…really.” Peter’s forehead creased in memory. “Elizabeth was too busy with summer school, to get ahead on her class load, and I really didn’t want to join her family in their vacation home in the Hamptons, without her. Or with her, really.”

Mike could imagine. “Yeah, this is nice.” He sank a little lower into the hot water and flicked some foam at Peter. “Honeymoon or not. Actually, it is, if you think about it. We’re as good as hitched. Live together…look after kids…” But Peter still looked—

“Hey.” Mike got his attention. “If we could, I would.”

“Would what?”

“Marry you.”

“ _What?_ ”

“Propose, I mean.”

“Oh yeah? And what makes you think I’d accep— _bluuurrgh_.” The splutter was Peter making the mistake of still talking when Mike pulled him under the frothy water. He re-emerged and Mike tried to avoid the foam Peter’s puppy-like head and shoulder shaking sprayed over him.

“Yeah, you would.” Mike pointed at him.

“And how do you know I wouldn’t propose first?”

“Huh.” Mike hadn’t considered that.

“Would you, I mean, what would you say?”

“Well, that all depends, good buddy. I mean, are you gonna serenade me, make it a musical pop the question? Cause I’m holding out for the French horn, here.” He lifted his coffee and plate high enough to avoid losing his drink and food to the waves as Peter yanked on his legs, to drag him under. “Do you need to ask?” he queried, after coming back up, setting his cup and plate down and positioning Peter to lie against him. “Really?”

“I guess not.” Peter settled against Mike’s chest.

“You guessed right, shotgun.” Mike held him as tightly as he could, and dared to dream…

* * * *

“Why are we going back to this floor?” he enquired, later, adjusting his overnight bag on his shoulder. He’d thought they would be saying so long to Elizabeth, who was coming back to the pad for dinner after the conference, and splitting. He’d had a bellyful of this hotel.

“I still can’t find the key to the first room, after moving last night.” Peter patted again at his pockets. “I thought I might have left it in the door.”

“If you did, I’m guessing someone found it by now.” But Mike strode down the corridor with Peter.

“I could even have left it in there.” Peter laid his palm on the door, and it opened. “Oh. Not locked. I could just stick my head in and— _Micky_?”

“And…Micky?” Mike echoed, understanding Peter’s exclamation when he followed Peter in. “ _Micky?_ What are you d…” Micky stood frozen with his leg raised, in the act of trying to get his pants on.

“ _Shhh!_ ” Micky cast a frantic look at the bed over by the wall. The _occupied_ bed. “Take this outside!”

But Mike stood rooted to the spot, as did Peter, their gazes tracking over the clothes strewn on the floor. The…pants. The…shirt. The…tie. The—

“It’s not what it looks like!” Micky hissed. “I can explain!”

“I…I’d rather not know,” Peter whispered.

“Me too.” Mike nodded, managing to get his shoulder to Peter’s and turn him around, then shove him forward, to start them walking. And exit the room. They mystery of the missing room key had been solved, anyway.

“It’s not what you think!” Micky insisted, joining them, scrabbling into his shoes.

“I think…you might have had too much to drink and he was there and saw that, and brought you up here to sleep it off and fell asleep himself?” Mike said.

“Oh…” Micky’s eyes narrowed and his lips pursed. He gave a quick nod. “Yes, that’s good! That works! I mean, that’s right! Exactly. Drinking and—”

“And I think you’d better get back in there. Don’t leave him to wake up alone. That’s really awful bed-etiquette,” Peter told him.

“Back? In there? With—”

They left Micky still gibbering in the corridor. “Don’t,” Mike begged Peter, calling the elevator. “Let’s not. Let’s make like we were never here. Didn’t see. Can we just leave? We don’t gotta do anything more?”

“We have to leave the key for Jo-Ann’s motorbike at Reception,” Peter reminded him.

“Oh yes.” Mike again wondered why.

“Can we take another look at the pool?” Peter grinned. “You know, get an idea of pool architecture for when you have your Bel Air mansion?”

“Bel Air?” Yeah, he wouldn’t say no. “Sure.” They took the short corridor they’d found yesterday and, outside, headed along the courtyard, then down the stone steps.

“Oh.” Peter pointed at the tape barrier, cordoning off the space that didn’t now contain hotel guests lounging on sunbeds or frolicking in the pool. He indicated the photographer with his cameras and assistants. “I guess they’re shooting something?”

“A commercial, maybe? Nice one too.” Mike cast an eye over the bevy of beauties in bathing suits. A bell rang and everyone relaxed, the girls arranged around the man sitting on the edge of the pool standing and stretching.

“Advertising what?”

“Well, the guy’s in a tux, holding a drink, so classy whiskey?”

“And the girls?”

“Expensive bikinis?” At least, they were all wearing those items of clothing. “Wow, some lookers, huh?”

“I’ll say. Hey, one’s coming over! Oh, she looks a little like—”

“ _Jo-Ann?_ ” Mike and Peter yelped as the tall waitress from the Duke Box stalked around the pool to where they stood near the sunbeds. “ _Jo-Ann?_ ” Mike queried again, just to be sure, because this Amazon, her pretty face made beautiful with makeup, her long blonde hair in perfect waves, her mile-long legs going all the way to her—

She laughed, and reached up both hands to close their jaws for them.

“You’re a model?” Mike blurted, looking at her bikini, then wishing he hadn’t when she bent her head to get him to look at her face.

“Actress. We’re shooting the movie poster. Awful James Bond imitation movie, as you can see, but…” She shrugged, and Mike fought not to let his eyes follow the movements of her—

“Actress?” His voice did that strangled squeal he hated.

“Oh, you think my life’s ambition is to serve drinks at a might club? I support myself from that and, yeah, some modeling, too. Well, what’s a good Scandinavia girl from Delaware to do while waiting for her big break in movies?”

“Ah, _svenska_!” said Peter, in the manner of one solving a puzzle. “ _Och kallade_ _Johanna_?”

“ _Ya_ _. D_ _u är…norsk?_ ” Jo-Ann sounded like she was guessing.

“Yes, Norwegian ancestry,” Peter explained to her. “Not Swedish, like you, _Johanna_.”

“That explains why you’re not that tall!” Jo-Ann accepted a glass of water from an assistant.

If Jo-Ann thought Peter, at just under six foot, wasn’t that tall, what in the world had she thought about Davy?

As if Mike’s thought had transferred, Jo-Ann caught his eye. “I know Davy’s seeing Leah. You don’t have to be afraid to mention it, or…of anything Davy related.”

_Like…the fact she and Leah had—_

“It just didn’t work. Work out,” she elaborated. “Nothing happened. Clean slate. How many more synonyms do I have to come up with?”

“For?” Peter gestured at a sun lounger for Jo-Ann to sit. Mainly because he needed to, Mike guessed. He knew the feeling, collapsing next to Peter, opposite the blonde stunner.

“The fact there’s nothing preventing you asking me out for some…playtime. Or, actually, I guess that would be asking me in.” She sat back, twirling her hair around her wrist.

“ _You_ …meaning…” Mike was proud his voice worked. He tried to tell her without words that he and Peter, Peter and him—

“ _Ni._ ” She grinned, showing very white teeth in her tan face. “It’s easier to differentiate in Swedish. The second person singular from the second person—”

“Plural.” Peter swallowed.

The assistant came back and whispered to Jo-Ann, who stood. “You know where to find me,” she called with a wink, walking off and leaving silence in her wake.

Mike found his voice. “Did she just—”

“Tell us that she doesn’t find three a crowd?” Peter swallowed again. “Oh yes.”

“Huh.”

“I’ll see your _huh_ and raise you a _whoa_.” Peter looked at him, his eyes as wide and as his eyebrows raised as high as Mike’s.

“Huh,” Mike said again. “Been a heck of a weekend so far. So, barring any surprise invites to threesomes, or surprise visits from exes, next week should be—”

“More of the same,” Peter finished for him, and in deference to the people working nearby, they both tried to stifle their laughter.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you enjoyed it! I'll write more if I get another idea.  
> 


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